Relative Activities of Deformation Modes in AZ31 Magnesium Alloy Predicted by Mesoscopic Crystalline Model

A mesoscopic crystalline model was proposed to quantitatively analyze the relative activities of deformation modes involved in the plastic deformation of an AZ31 magnesium alloy at room temperature. The plastic response of a cast AZ31 magnesium alloy with random texture can be well predicted by this model. It is demonstrated that the remarkable difference of relative activities of pyramidal slip should be attributed to the different strain hardening behavior in tension and compression. Further TEM micrographs shows the occurrence of pyramidal slip in compression, which confirms the validity of the proposed model.