Effect of strain energy on corrosion behavior of ultrafine-grained (UFG)
copper prepared by severe plastic deformation (SPD) was investigated in term
of microstructural evolution. The SPD processed material showed an
ultrafine-grained (UFG) structure after grain refinement for several time
processes, which will affect mechanical and corrosion behavior. homogeneous,
can be obtained efficiently through the pressing process or is commonly
known as simple shear extrusion (SSE), which one of the SPD techniques. Pure
copper was processed by SSE for two, four, eight and twelve passes. The
structure of SSE treated sample was observed by laser microscope and
transmission electron microscope as well as X-ray diffraction, The corrosion
behavior by potentiodynamic polarization curve was observed modified
Livingstone solution, 1 M NaCl and sulphuric solution. The structure of SSE
processed showed that the first pass of the SSE processed sample showed
large deformation by developing the elongated grain and sub-grain structure.
By increasing the SSE pass number, the grain shape became equiaxed due to
excessive strain. The X-ray broadening related to ultrafine-grained (UFG)
structure processed SSE on the copper sample, leading to smaller crystallite
size, higher microstrain, and higher dislocation density. The passive film
was developed more homogeneous on the material with UFG structure
appearance. However, the current density in 1 M NaCl decreased by an
increment of pass number due to the dissolution of copper metal. The UFG
structure has more boundaries than coarse grain structure, and these
phenomena show why Cu dissolve ability influences the current density. The
grain boundary behaves as the cathodic site.