Improvement of strength and performance properties of copper wire during severe plastic deformation and drawing process

The paper studies the evolution of microstructure and mechanical properties of copper wire during a new combined straining process. The main point of the technological process is to strain the wire in a rotating equal-channel step die and subsequent drawing. The die rotates around the wire axis and thereby creates tension due to equal-channel angular pulling and twisting in the die. Transmission electron microscopy and EBSD analysis, as well as tensile testing and microhardness determination investigated the strained copper wire. Ultra-fine grain gradient microstructure with a high component of high-angle grain boundaries was obtained as a result of straining. The tensile strength of the strained copper wire compared to the unstrained one increases more than twice from 302 to 635 MPa, and the yield strength increases from 196 to 406 MPa. The use of such hardened copper wire in construction will reduce the weight of the structure due to the reduction of diameter.