Forty-Five Years of Superplastic Research: Recent Developments and Future Prospects

Abstract

Although superplasticity has a long history, dating back to the first laboratory-scale observations in 1934, the major new developments in superplasticity have occurred almost exclusively over the last four decades. Furthermore, this corresponds to the period associated with the ICSAM conferences which started with a first conference in San Diego, California, in June 1982 and has continued to ICSAM-2015 in Tokyo, Japan. Major developments over this time include the growth of a vibrant and effective superplastic forming industry and an extension of the concept of metallic superplasticity to include both ceramics and geological materials. This paper examines the significance of these developments and discusses future prospects and new opportunities within the field of superplastic research.

Experimental Investigation of the Effect of Temperature and Strain Rate on the Superplastic Deformation Behavior of Ti-Based Alloys in the (α+β) Temperature Field

“…It is well known that the elongation to failure in superplastic deformation is very sensitive to the strain-induced microstructure evolution [41,42,[46][47][48]. For all studied alloys, the maximum elongation was obtained in the deformation regimes, providing close-to-zero values of the strain hardening coefficient.…”

A Lifetime of Research in Creep, Superplasticity, and Ultrafine‐Grained Materials

“…[25] Experiments at USC led to an exceptional superplastic elongation of 4850% in a Pb-62% Sn eutectic alloy [26] and this result was subsequently reported in the Guinness Book of World Records as shown in Figure 7, where the sample is shown at the top and the description of the record is given at the bottom. [27] Unfortunately, this record was removed from the Guinness Book in later years and this meant that subsequent even higher elongations were not recorded as with 5500% in an aluminum-bronze [28] and a record-breaking 7550% in the Pb-Sn alloy. [29] Figure 5.…”

Developments in superplasticity over the last three decades with emphasis on research in Ufa

“…This latter review effectively established superplasticity as a viable scientific area of considerable interest and industrial potential, especially because of the development of the superplastic forming industry for the fabrication of curved and complex parts for a range of commercial products [4]. Thereafter, an exceptional elongation of 4850 % was achieved in the Pb-Sn eutectic alloy [5] and reported in the Guinness Book of World Records [6] and later an even higher elongation of 7550 % was attained in the same alloy when testing at 413 K with a grain size of 11.6 μm as shown in Fig. 2 [7].…”