Age hardening studies of a Cu–4Ti–Cr–Fe alloy

ABSTRACT

The microstructure, mechanical properties, and electrical conductivity (EC) of Cu–4Ti–Cr–Fe alloy aged at 773 K in vacuum are studied in this work. The results show that the multiple trace alloying elements have little effect on the microstructure evolution during the aging treatment at 773 K. However, with prolonged aging, the hardness, yield strength, and tensile strength first increase, then decrease. The Cu–4Ti–Cr–Fe alloys show superior hardness and strength performance than other alloys. In both the solid-solution treated and aged cases, the EC decreases if multiple trace alloying elements are added to the Cu–4wt-%Ti alloys, which indicates the CuTi intermetallic compound may have a large negative influence on the EC of copper alloy.

KEYWORDS:

• Alloy design
• aging treatment
• copper alloy
• mechanical properties
• electrical conductivity

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China: [grant number 51374151].