Claims
- 1. A method for the manufacture of a copper alloy, comprising the steps of:
- a) casting a precipitation hardenable copper alloy containing from about 0.001% to about 2.0% by weight chromium and from about 0.001% to about 2.0% by weight zirconium;
- b) heating said copper alloy for at least partial homogenization;
- c) hot rolling said copper alloy to an area reduction in excess of about 50%;
- d) cold rolling said copper alloy to an area reduction in excess of about 25%;
- e) recrystallizing said copper alloy for a first time;
- f) cold rolling said copper alloy to a cross sectional area reduction of from about 40% to about 90%;
- g) recrystallizing said copper alloy for a second time at a temperature effective to produce the desired aging response during precipitation aging;
- h) cold rolling said copper alloy to final gauge; and
- i) precipitation aging said copper alloy.
- 2. The method of claim 1 wherein in step g, said copper alloy is recrystallized a second time at a temperature in excess of 925.degree. C.
- 3. The method of claim 2 wherein the temperature for recrystallization in step e and in step g is independently between about 500.degree. C. and the solidus temperature of said copper alloy.
- 4. The method of claim 3 wherein the temperature for recrystallization in step e and in step g is independently between about 800.degree. C. and 950.degree. C.
- 5. The method of claim 3 wherein the dwell time for recrystallization in step e and step g is independently between about 5 seconds and 16 hours.
- 6. The method of claim 5 wherein the dwell time for recrystallization in step e and step g is independently between about 30 seconds and 5 minutes.
- 7. The method of claim 6 wherein the precipitation aging temperature of step i is from about 350.degree. C. to about 600.degree. C. and the dwell time is from about 15 minutes to about 16 hours.
- 8. The method of claim 4 wherein said alloy is selected to consist essentially of 0.4%-1.2% by weight chromium, 0.08%-0.2% zirconium, 0.03%-0.06% magnesium and the balance copper.
- 9. The method of claim 4 wherein said alloy is selected to consist essentially of from an effective amount to increase strength up to about 1.0% by weight chromium, from about 0.05% to about 0.40% by weight zirconium, from about 0.1 to about 1.0% by weight of "M" where "M" is selected from the group consisting of cobalt, iron, nickel and mixtures thereof with a maximum nickel content of about 0.25% by weight, and from about 0.05% to about 0.7% by weight titanium where the atomic ratio of "M" to titanium, M:Ti, is from about 1.2:1 to about 7.0:1.
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
This application is a continuation in part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/135,760 filed Oct. 18, 1993, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,370,840 which is a continuation in part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/971,499 filed Nov. 4, 1992, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,306,465 to Caron et al.
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Continuations (1)
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971499 |
Nov 1992 |
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Continuation in Parts (1)
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Oct 1993 |
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