Deformation and recrystallization of hexagonal metals: Modeling and experimental results for zinc

A polycrystal approach that divides the grains into small cells and account s for local interactions in a self consistent way is used to calculate defo rmation and texture evolution of hexagonal zinc. As this model incorporates local effects, it predicts intragranular deformation and gives a descripti on of the deformed microstructure in terms of misorientation between elemen ts and variation in stored energy. This provides information which can be u sed as a basis for simulating recrystallization processes. The grains are c omposed of parallelepipedic cells, and a Monte Carlo algorithm is used for simulating static recrystallization. Nucleation and boundary mobility depen d on the misorientation between cells and on the local variation in stored energy. The model is applied to simulate the kinetics of static recrystalli zation and the associated change in crystallographic texture in zinc polycr ystals. Experimental results obtained by deforming zinc in plane strain com pression compare well with the predictions and are consistent with a mechan ism where nucleation occurring in highly deformed domains controls the recr ystallization kinetic. (C) 2001 Acta Materialia Inc. published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.