This datasheet provides information on composition limits, fabrication characteristics, processing effects on physical and mechanical properties, product specifications, and applications of medium-strength structural aluminum alloy 6082. The fabrication characteristics of alloy 6082 are compared with related alloys and tempers.

The development of aluminum alloys has progressed along two tracks: heat treatable and non-heat treatable. The Aluminum Association alloy composition limits and product temper are defined for major alloying elements. This article summarizes the historical evolution of the different series of wrought aluminum alloys (1xxx to 8xxx) and discusses their applications based on the alloying system introduced by the Aluminum Association.

The presence of macroscopic residual stresses in heat treatable aluminum alloys can give rise to machining distortion, dimensional instability, and increased susceptibility to in-service fatigue and stress-corrosion cracking. This article details the residual-stress magnitudes and distributions introduced into aluminum alloys by thermal operations associated with heat treatment. The available technologies by which residual stresses in aluminum alloys can be relieved are also described. The article shows why thermal stress relief is not a feasible stress-reduction technology for precipitation-hardened alloys. It examines the consequences of aging treatments on the residual stress, namely, annealing, precipitation heat treatment, and cryogenic treatment. The article provides information on uphill quenching, which attempts to reverse thermal gradients encountered during quenching. It examines how quench-induced residual stresses in heat treatable aluminum alloys are reduced when sufficient load is applied to cause plastic deformation. The article also shows how plastic deformation reduces residual stress.

This article focuses on friction stir welding (FSW), where frictional heating and displacement of the plastic material occurs by a rapidly rotating tool traversing the weld joint. Much of the research activity early on pertained to issues related to understanding the process, such as learning about material flow, heat generation, microstructure development, and many other fundamental issues. The article summarizes the results of the research, describing the aspects of how FSW actually accomplishes sound joints in metals without melting them. It discusses the FSW process variations and the practical aspects of heat generation. The article provides information on the effect of welding on material properties and typical alloys in FSW applications. The alloys include 6061 aluminum, 5083 aluminum, 2xxx aluminum, and 7xxx aluminum alloys. The article concludes with a discussion on FSW equipment.

This article describes the different types of precipitation and transformation processes and their effects that can occur during heat treatment of various nonferrous alloys. The nonferrous alloys are aluminum alloys, copper alloys, magnesium alloys, nickel alloys, titanium alloys, cobalt alloys, zinc alloys, and heat treatable silver alloys, gold alloys, lead alloys, and tin alloys. It also provides a detailed discussion on the effects due to precipitation and transformation processes in these non-ferrous alloys.

Heat treatment of aluminum alloys frequently refers to the heat treatable aluminum alloys that can be strengthened by solution treatment, quenching, and subsequent hardening. This article introduces the general metallurgy of strengthening aluminum alloys by heat treatment. It discusses various heat treatable alloying elements, such as copper, chromium, iron, magnesium, silicon, zinc, and lithium. The article describes the age-hardening treatments and generalized precipitation sequence for aluminum alloys. It reviews the solution heat treatment in terms of solution heating time and temperature, as well as high-temperature oxidation. The article also discusses quench sensitivity, vacancy loss, grain-boundary precipitates, and quench delay for the heat treatment of aluminum. It concludes with a discussion on the deformation of aluminum alloys prior to aging.

This article provides an overview of fatigue and fracture resistance of aluminum alloys. It discusses the characteristics of aluminum alloy classes and the fracture mechanics of aluminum alloys. The article tabulates relative stress-corrosion cracking ratings for high-strength wrought aluminum products. It analyzes the selection of various alloys for stress-corrosion cracking resistance, including aluminum-lithium alloys, copper-free 7XXX alloys, and casting alloys. The article presents a list of typical tensile properties and fatigue limit of aluminum alloys. It also describes the effects of composition, microstructure, thermal treatments, and processing in fatigue crack growth of aluminum alloys.

This article introduces the basic characteristics, processes, and product forms associated with the five major categories of aluminum wrought products, namely, flat-rolled products (sheet, plate, and foil); rod, bar, and wire; tubular products; profiles; and forgings. It summarizes the various product forms in which commonly used wrought aluminum alloys are available. The article also provides design guidelines for aluminum extrusions and discusses various forming methods.

This article focuses on the general internal state variable method, and its simplification, for single-parameter models, in which the microstructure evolution may be treated as an isokinetic reaction. It explains that isokinetic microstructure models are applied to diffusional transformations in fusion welding, covering particle dissolution, growth, and coarsening of precipitates in the heat-affected zone. The article discusses the versatility of the internal state variable approach in modeling of nonisothermal transformations for various materials and processes. It describes the process models applied to predict the microstructure evolution in Al-Mg-Si alloys during multistage thermal processing involving heat treatment and welding. The article also provides information on the microstructure models exploited in engineering design to optimize the load-bearing capacity of welded aluminum components.

This article describes the effects of alloying and heat treatment on the metastable transition precipitates that occur in age hardenable aluminum alloys. Early precipitation stages are less well understood than later ones. This article details the aging sequence and characteristics of precipitates that occur in the natural aging and artificial aging of Al-Mg-Si-(Cu) alloys, Al-Mg-Cu alloys, microalloyed Al-Mg-Cu-(Ag, Si) alloys, aluminum-lithium-base alloys, and Al-Zn-Mg-(Cu) alloys. Crystal structure, composition, dimensions, and aging conditions of precipitates are detailed. Effects of reversion, duplex annealing, and retrogression and re-aging are included.

Laser surface hardening is a noncontact process that provides a chemically inert and clean environment as well as flexible integration with operating systems. This article provides a brief discussion on the various conventional surface-modification techniques to enhance the surface and mechanical properties of ferrous and nonferrous alloys. The techniques are physical vapor deposition, chemical vapor deposition, sputtering, ion plating, electroplating, electroless plating, and displacement plating. The article describes five categories of laser surface modification, namely, laser surface heat treatment, laser surface melting such as skin melting or glazing, laser direct metal deposition such as cladding, alloying, and hardfacing, laser physical vapor deposition, and laser shock peening. The article provides detailed information on absorptivity, laser scanning technology, and thermokinetic phase transformations. It also describes the influence of cooling rate on laser heat treatment and the effect of processing parameters on temperature, microstructure, and case depth hardness.

This article begins with a discussion on the environmental factors that induce corrosion in magnesium alloys. It reviews the factors that determine the severity of different forms of localized corrosion, namely, galvanic corrosion, corrosion fatigue, and stress-corrosion. The article discusses corrosion protection in magnesium assemblies and the protective coating systems used in corrosion protection practices. Protection schemes for specific applications and the production of novel magnesium alloys with improved corrosion resistance are also reviewed. The article concludes with a discussion on the corrosion of bulk vapor-deposited alloys and magnesium-matrix composites.

The primary purpose of this article is to describe general root causes of failure that are associated with wrought metals and metalworking. This includes a brief review of the discontinuities or imperfections that may be common sources of failure-inducing defects in the bulk working of wrought products. The article addresses the types of flaws or defects that can be introduced during the steel forging process itself, including defects originating in the ingot-casting process. Defects found in nonferrous forgings—titanium, aluminum, and copper and copper alloys—also are covered.

Weldability is a function of three major factors: base material quality, welding process, and design. This article focuses on base-metal weldability of aluminum alloys in terms of mechanical property degradation in both the weld region and heat-affected zone, weld porosity, and susceptibility to solidification cracking and liquation cracking. It provides an overview on welding processes, including gas metal arc welding, gas tungsten arc welding, resistance spot and seam welding, laser beam welding, and various solid-state welding processes. A review on joint design is also included, mainly in the general factors associated with service weldability (fitness). The article also provides a discussion on the selection and weldability of non-heat-treatable aluminum alloys, heat treatable aluminum alloys, aluminum-lithium alloys, and aluminum metal-matrix composites.

This article focuses on the industrial applications of phase diagrams. It presents examples to illustrate how a multicomponent phase diagram calculation can be readily useful for industrial applications. The article demonstrates how the integration of a phase diagram calculation with kinetic and microstructural evolution models greatly enhances the power of the CALPHAD approach in materials design and processing development. It also discusses the limitations of the CALPHAD approach.

This article summarizes the characteristics, material properties, and typical applications of aluminum alloy wrought products. It describes the most widely used worldwide alloy designation system and discusses five major categories, namely flat-rolled products; rod, bar, and wire; tubular products; shapes; and forgings. The article also discusses three widely used indexes to define the fracture resistance of aluminum alloys: notch toughness, tear resistance, and plane-strain fracture toughness. It also describes three types of corrosion attack of these alloys: general or atmospheric surface corrosion, stress-corrosion cracking, and exfoliation attack.

This article provides an overview of integrated weld modeling and presents strategic goals for the welding industry. It discusses the fundamentals of the underlying physics and the methodologies to solve the same. The article presents the pioneering work done to predict the heat-affected zone and weld metal microstructure in the early 1980s and 1990s. Applications of computational thermodynamics and kinetics tools to weld metal microstructure prediction for liquid-gas reactions and liquid-slag reactions that happen as a function of high-to-low temperature during fusion welding are discussed. The article also includes a brief discussion on weldability prediction, residual stress prediction, and distortion prediction. It concludes with information on the use of optimization methodologies.

This article provides an overview of integrated weld modeling and discusses the fundamentals of the underlying physics and methodologies involved in process modeling. It presents approaches for microstructure modeling that help to predict phase fractions as well as grain size in the heat-affected zone and weld metal region as a function of alloy composition and thermal cycles. The article discusses the uses of computational thermodynamic and kinetic tools. It describes the concept of performance modeling, whose goal relates to the prediction of weldability, geometrical distortion, and/or locked-in residual stress as a function of material, restraint, process, and process parameters as well as service temperature. Finally, the article presents a case study, evaluating the use of X-65 steels using the E-WeldPredictor tool.

This article is a detailed account of additive manufacturing (AM) processes for copper and copper alloys such as copper-chromium alloys, GRCop, oxide-dispersion-strengthened copper, copper-nickel alloys, copper-tin alloys, copper-zinc alloys, and copper-base shape memory alloys. The AM processes include binder jetting, ultrasonic additive manufacturing, directed-energy deposition, laser powder-bed fusion, and electron beam powder-bed fusion. The article presents a review of the literature and state of the art for copper alloy AM and features data on AM processes and industrial practices, copper alloys used, selected applications, material properties, and where applicable, compares these data and properties to traditionally processed materials. The data presented and the surrounding discussion focus on bulk metallurgical processing of copper components. The discussion covers the composition and performance criteria for copper alloys that have been reported for AM and discusses key differences in process-structure-property relationships compared to conventionally processed material. The article also provides information on feedstock considerations for copper powder handling.