Constitutive modelling of the elastic-plastic behaviour of 7050-T7451 aluminium alloy

This paper presents an extension of the Ramaswamy, Stouffer, and Laflen unified elastic-viscoplastic theory which uses internal state variables to represent a strain rate insensitive aluminium alloy namely 7050-T7451 alloy. The model constants are evaluated from the results of a uniaxial tensile test, with strain hold at saturation, and a fatigue loop. Strain holds in the saturated region of tensile monotonic curves resulted in significant amounts of stress relaxation. The material response is cyclically stable and reveals a strong Bauschinger effect. There is a significant reduction in the yield stress between the initial yield and the subsequent tensile yield stress observed after a fully reversed fatigue cycle. All of these material characteristics were predicted successfully.