Institute of Metals Division - Cold-Rolled Textures of Silicon-Iron Crystals

Si-Fe single crystals in a number of selected orientations were cold rolled 70 pct and analyzed to obtain quantitative (110) pole figures. Stable end orientations were ddetermined, and the effect of orientation on deformation behavior was investigated. WHEN single crystals are cold rolled sufficiently, they rotate into end orientations that are stable or unchanged in position with additional deformation. The end orientations of heavily cold-rolled iron crystals, positioned in holes in copper to limit lateral flow and to simulate polycrystalline conditions during deformation, were determined by Barrett and Levenson.' They found that the sum of the end orientations, a pole figure for all the crystals studied, reproduced the essential features of the cold-rolled texture of polycrystalline iron. In. an investigation of Fe-Si alloys, Barrett, Ansel, and Mehl' observed little effect of silicon content on the textures of heavily cold-rolled samples. Since alloys with less than 4 pct Si are known to have the same slip systems as iron," it seems logical to expect that they would also have the same end orientations as those for iron. Whereas Barrett and Levenson in their study of single crystals were interested in the problem of the origin of the cold-rolled texture of polycrystalline iron, the present authors are more interested in the final cold-rolled textures of single crystals of Si-Fe from the point of view of their relationship to subsequent recrystallization phenomena which will be reported in another paper. Nevertheless, such points as the tendency of an end orientation not to rotate (stability), the tendency of a pole concentration to spread out, and the tendency of the crystal to widen during cold rolling become interesting separately when the initial orientations are selected already in end orientations. Also the initial orientations having a [I101 axis parallel with the transverse direction, which include the two end orientations (111) [Ti21 and (001) [110], comprise a series that needs further clarification regarding the way such crystals rotate during deformation. Finally the present use of quantitative pole figure methods* represents an advance over the X-ray photographic method employed by Barrett and Levenson in their work on end orientations. The present investigation provides information on the cold-rolling behavior of two groups of Si-Fe crystals: 1-—crystals initially oriented in recognized end orientations for iron crystals with a [I101 direction parallel with the rolling direction, and 2— crystals initially oriented with a [I101 direction 90" to the rolling direction and in the rolling plane. For the second group, there is a 90" range between the (001) [110] orientation and the (110) [001] orientation. Since the 35" portion of this range from (110) [OOl] to (111) Di2] was included in a previous investigation," only the remaining 55" portion from (111) fii2] to (001) [I101 needs further consideration. Also, since both (111) [xi21 and (001) [I101 are end orientations for iron crystals,' there might be a critical orientation* or orientation range be- • W. W. Martin and C. G. Dunno noted that (112) [Till was such a critical orientation. tween them such that early in the deformation an orientation within this critical range splits into two orientations. Upon further deformation, these two orientations rotate to produce a final texture consisting of (001) [1101 and (111) [?i2] components. The end orientations obtained are discussed in connection with the work of Barrett and Levenson, while the observed tendency for lateral flow of crystals in these orientations is treated in terms of the theory of Hibbard and Yen.' Lateral flow according to the theory increases with deviation of the plane containing the rolling direction and the slip direction from a position perpendicular to the plane of rolling. Experimental Procedure Single crystals in sheet form with preselected orientations were prepared by methods that have been described elsewhere." Three lots designated A, B,