Effect of Rotation of the Principal Stress Axes Relative to the Material on the Evolution of Material Properties in Severe Plastic Deformation Processes

Severe plastic deformation (SPD) processes are widely used for improving material properties. A distinguishing feature of many SPD processes is that the principal axes of the stress tensor intensively rotate relative to the material. Nevertheless, no measure of this rotation is involved in the constitutive equations that predict the evolution of material properties. In particular, a typical way of describing the effect of SPD processes on material properties is to show the dependence of various parameters that characterize these properties on the equivalent strain. However, the same level of the equivalent strain can be achieved in a process in which the principal axes of the stress tensor do not rotate relative to the material. It is, therefore, vital to understand which properties are dependent and which properties are independent of the rotation of the principal axes of the stress tensor relative to the material. In the present paper, a new multistage SPD process is designed such that the principal stress axes do not rotate relative to the material during each stage of the process but the directions of the major and minor principal stresses interchange between two subsequent stages. The process is practically plane strain, and it may be named the process of upsetting by V-shape dies. In addition, axisymmetric compression by Rastegaev’s method is conducted. In this case, the principal stress axes are fixed in the material throughout the entire process of deformation. Material properties and microstructure generated in the two processes above are compared to reveal the effect of the rotation of the principal stress axes relative to the material on the evolution of these properties.