ME Lab Experiment Report

Experiment: AGING CURVES

PRECIPITATION HARDENING OF 2219 ALUMINIUM

ALLOY

Instructor: Dr. Subodh Kumar

Submitted by:
Ankita Maske
Abhijeet Nayak
Sarbajit Manna
Shubham Netam

Aim of the Experiment:

To study the precipitation hardening behaviour of the 2219 alloy (Al-6.5%Cu) as a
function of aging time.
Materials & Equipment used:

Emery papers (grid numbers 1000-3000)

Furnace for solutionizing treatment
Oven for artificial aging treatment
Optical microscope
Vickers hardness tester

Theory:
2219 Alloy: It is an age hardenable Copper containing alloy used in welded aircraft
parts and high temperature application structural components.
Precipitation hardening: It is a heat treatment process for strengthening metal
matrix in which hardness is enhanced by the formation of extremely small
uniformly dispersed particles of second phase within the original phase matrix.
It utilizes the ability of precipitate to impede the motion of dislocations, thus
strengthening the material. The stress required for the dislocations to bypass the
precipitate, is given by:
=Gb/l
Where,
G: shear modulus of the matrix
b: burger vector of the dislocation
l: distance between the precipitate particles
therefore, as l decreases, the shear stress to bypass increases.
Two basic requirements of the hardenable alloys are:
1. Solid solubility decrease with decrease in temperature
2. The precipitate should form coherent interface with matrix
Precipitation hardening involves 3 major steps:

1. Solutionizing (solution heat treatment):

Alloy is heated above solvus temperature and held there until a homogenous solid
solution () is produced, prevents segregation. precipitate is dissolved in this
step. The temperature is kept as high as possible without incipient melting.
In this experiment the alloy is heated in the two phase region below the
eutectic temperature.

Fig. 1 Diagram showing 3 stages of precipitation hardening.

2.
Quenching:
Single phase () is rapidly cooled. Creates super saturated solid solution containing
Cu and is not an equilibrium phase. Due to rapid solidification, the atoms do not
have sufficient time to diffuse to potential nucleation sites.
In case of slow cooling, solute precipitates out at the grain boundary which doesnt
result in strengthening. While too fast cooling results in warpage. So optimum
cooling rate needs to be maintained.
3. Aging:
Process of keeping the sample at a temperature for prolonged time. This results in
coherent precipitates, which impedes the dislocation movement resulting in alloy
strengthening. As the supersaturated () is not stable, Cu atoms diffuse to
numerous nucleation sites and precipitates grow. The formation of a finely

dispersed precipitate in the alloy is the objective of the precipitation-hardening

process. Two types of aging:
Natural aging: Aging occurs at Room temperature. Only GP zones are formed in
this process, therefore strength saturates after a certain period of time
Artificial aging: Samples are kept at a higher temperature, below solvus
temperature. For Al-Cu alloys, range of artificial aging is 130-190oC. Overheating
results in formation of equilibrium phase, which is not coherent, resulting in
overage and decreasing strength.
The precipitation sequence of Al-Cu alloy is:
GP 1 zone (Al2Cu)
GP-1 zone: completely coherent ordered Cu atoms segregate on {100}. At room
temperature this size is 3-7 nm thick and at 70-130C the diameter is of the order of 10-15 nm.
This results in distortion of lattice which inhibits the dislocation movement, causing increase in
hardness but decrease in ductility.

or (GP-2 zone): Slightly bigger than GP zone and hence less in number than
GP-1 zone. It has two layers of Cu atoms separated by three layers of Al atoms on
{100}. The size range for the " phase is 10-100 nm diameter, and 1-4 nm thick.
: It is a metastable precipitate of Al2Cu. It is semi-coherent with the matrix and it
forms as tetragonal plates with different lattice parameter than the matrix. At this
stage the precipitate is surrounded by dislocations in order to reduce coherency
strains. This results in decrease in strength, i.e. over aging. Size ranges from 10 to
600 nm diameter with a thickness of 10-15 nm.
(CuAl2): It is the equilibrium precipitate and is formed when the alloy is
overaged. It is coarsely dispersed in the matrix and has a body centred tetragonal
structure.
Properties of the precipitates:
Table 1: Properties of the precipitate formed during ageing of Al-Cu alloy
Precipitate
GP1 zone
GP2 zone or

Crystal structure
Pure Cu segregating
on (100)
Alternate layer of Al
and Cu

Shape
Disc shaped

Remarks
1 or 2 layer thick

Disc or
Plate
shaped

Larger and thicker than GP1 zone,2

layer of Cu followed by 3 layer of
Aluminium.

Al2Cu, Tetragonal
Al2Cu, BCT

Plate shaped
Equilibrium
precipitate

Coherent with matrix

Incoherent ppt., coarsely dispersed.

Experimental Procedure:
2219 chemical composition:
Elements
Cu
Mn
Zr
V
Ti
Si
Fe
Mg
Zn
Al

Composition (wt %
age)
5.8-6.8
0.2-0.4
0.1-0.25
0.05-0.15
0.02-0.1
0.2
0.3
0.02
0.1
Balance

Sample is solutionized at 540C.

Quenched by cold water.
Aging at 175C.
9 small cuboidal samples were polished to nearly mirror finish.
Then they were kept in a furnace at 540C for 30 mins and then quenched in
water at room temperature.
The quenched samples were then artificially aged at 175C for different
times i.e. as solution treated, 0.25, 0.5, 1,2, 5, 10 ,15 ,20 ,25 ,50 and 100
hours respectively.
The indentations for the measurement of hardness values were made in a
Vickers hardness testing machine under 10 kgf load.
Results and Discussions:
time(hrs)
0
0.25

Hardness
81.798
83.281

0.5
1
2
5
20
25
50
100

82.65
85.7
109
123.3
128.6
132
124.4
116.75

1. The peak hardness of the sample solutionized at 540C for 30 mins and then
aged at 175C was found to be 1295 MPa at around 25 hrs.
2. The hardness calculated at different aging time is shown below:

Hardness vs Time(hrs)
140
120
100
80

Hardness (VHN)

60
40
20
0

20

40

60

80

100

120

Time (hrs)

3. The hardness curve follows the general aging curve trend, where initially the
formation of GP zones results in steep increase in hardness followed by
formation of causing maximum hardness and the formation of and
equilibrium precipitate causes decrease in hardness on further aging.
4. The microstructure of peak aged sample consists of and which causes
coherency strain resulting in peak hardness.
5. So, the service temperature is always kept below the point where we obtain
peak hardness, because if the service temperature crosses the point of peak
hardness, the sample will be over aged and thus we wont get the desired
hardness for the particular application.
6.

Hardness vs Time(hrs)
150
140

200C

130

150C

120

Hardness (VHN)

160C

110

185C

100

175C

90

90C

80
-10

70

10

30

50

70

90

110

Time (hrs)

For all the samples, maximum hardness is achieved between 5-25 hrs.
3It can be observed that maximum hardness is achieved at heat treatment
temperature of 90C.