Reducing the local stress in the vicinity of the grain boundaries is a favorable way to improve the super-elastic properties of super-elastic alloys. The crystal plasticity finite element method (CPFEM) was applied in this study to simulate the deformation behavior and local stress of a super-elastic Cu-8Al-11Mn (wt.%) alloy containing single grains with various orientations, columnar grains with different misorientation angles, and tri-crystals with distinct grain boundary morphologies. The results indicated that the stress distribution of single grains presented obvious orientation dependence during deformation. Uniformly distributed stress was observed in grains with orientations of 0° and 90° when more slip systems were activated during deformation. With the increase in the misorientation angles of columnar grains, the stresses in the vicinity of the grain boundaries increased, which was related to the difference in the shear stress of the slip systems in adjacent grains. When the difference in the shear stress of the slip systems in two adjacent grains was large, a local stress concentration formed in the vicinity of the grain boundary. Compared with the triple-junction grain boundaries, the local stresses of the straight and vertical grain boundaries were smaller, which was closely related to the number of activated slip systems on both sides of the grain boundary. The above results were obtained experimentally and could be used to design super-elastic alloys with high performance.
Keywords: Cu-Al-Mn alloy; crystal plasticity finite element method; deformation mechanism; grain boundary; local stress.