Papers by Author: Goroh Itoh

Abstract: In recent years, the use of hydrogen as a clean energy has been paid attention to in terms of the prevention of global warming. Tanks composed solely of steel and cylinders consisting of aluminum liner reinforced with C-FRP in the surrounding are used to store high-pressure hydrogen gas in hydrogen stations and in fuel cell vehicles, respectively. On the other hand, hydrogen embrittlement has been known to occur in some metallic materials under several certain conditions. Also, it has been generally known that the environmental hydrogen that invades the material during services plays major role in hydrogen embrittlement. For this reason, investigations on the behavior of environmental hydrogen in metallic materials are needed. In this study, the behavior of environmental hydrogen in pure aluminum, 6061 aluminum alloy and 7075 aluminum alloy has been investigated by means of tritium autoradiography.

Abstract: In recent years, the fossil fuel exhaustion and global warming have become serious problems. As a way to solve these problems, the development of the fuel cell vehicles has been paid attention to. In the fuel cell vehicles, high-pressure hydrogen gas is stored in a container consisting of aluminum liner and surrounding fiber-reinforced plastic layer. To increase the mileage per filling, an aluminum alloy having higher strength than the currently used 6061 alloy is needed. It has been known that increase in the Si content in 6000 series aluminum alloy brings about increase in the strength. In this study, a 6061 aluminum alloy with Si content of highest level (6061HS), 6061 alloy with a typical composition have been subjected to slow strain rate technique (SSRT) tensile tests in a moist air to assess the resistance to hydrogen embrittlement, and also to thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS) to investigate the hydrogen behavior. The results obtained have been discussed in terms of the effect of Si content. Moreover, to investigate the effect of grain size, 6061HS alloy sheets with different grain size have been also subjected to the SSRT tensile tests and TDS.

Abstract: In automobiles, a suspension bush, a set of aluminum parts connected to each other via rubber, is mounted into the suspension members to link the body to the wheels, and realizes hard and soft mounts contributing both to the stabilization during high speed driving and to absorbing the shock from the road. However, decohesion of the aluminum part from the rubber occurs occasionally, arising from the interface corrosion of aluminum, which deteriorates the performance of the vehicle directly. In this study, effects of alloy composition and processing route on this kind of corrosion will be investigated. Also, development of a new corrosion test that shortens the time for the test will be attempted.

Abstract: In recent years, reducing carbon dioxide is being demanded in terms of preventing global warming. Lightening autobodies is one of the most practical ways to conduct it, for which converting the body sheets from conventional steel to Al-Mg-Si alloy is effective. Although the Al-Mg-Si alloys have the advantage that they have hardenability during paint baking and do not cause stretcher strain patterns, poor formability is a crucial drawback. Bendability is one of the most important properties related to formability. However, there has been no assessing method having both speediness and quantitative reproducibility. In this study, we have developed a assessing method based on the electric resistance decrease arising from the decrease in conducting section when cracks are formed by bending. Bendability was assessed by electrical resistance change as well as by crack density on the tension surface measured with an SEM. It was found that the new method have far greater speediness with the same quantitative reproducibility than the crack measurement method.

Abstract: Thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS) technique has been used to study hydrogen behaviour in rapidly solidified (RS) aluminium (Al) both as-cast and exposed to humid air (HA). The surface morphology of the foils was studied through atomic force microscopy (AFM). Analysis was made of the effect of rapid solidification processing (RSP) on H/microstructure interactions, including investigation of alloying element (0.05 at % Ti) influence on H trapping in Al.

Abstract: Hydrogen (H) behaviour in materials was investigated in rapidly solidified (RS) foils of pure aluminium (Al), Al-0.4 Cr and Al-0.25 Zr alloys (at %) by means of thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS). In addition, Al-0.25; 0.3 Zr alloys were examined with respect to microstructure and its instability during the thermal process using SEM and microhardness measurements. The effect of dopes and heating rate on H desorption was summarized. The lowest energy desorption is attributed with significant thermal desorption peak which temperature was found is correlated with sample composition.

Abstract: The deformation mechanism in the nanometer grain size range has been basically investigated from the results of microstructural observation after superplastic deformation in a Zn-Al eutectoid alloy in which a reverse grain size dependence of superplasticity was previously reported: flow stress increases and elongation decreases with decreasing grain size when grain size is markedly reduced to nanometer range. By controlling the aging condition after solution treatment and subsequent quenching, two specimens are prepared: the as-quenched specimen with ultrafine grains of 83nm in diameter and aged specimen with normally fine grains of 2.6μm. The elongation is confirmed to be smaller in the as-quenched specimen than in the aged specimen, although the flow stress is lower. As a result of TEM observation on the interior of the grains, dislocations are rare in the as-quenched specimen, while a significant density of dislocations are observed in the aged specimen. This result strongly supports the mechanism previously proposed by Mishra et al. that the accommodation process, i.e., the dislocation glide inside the grains, becomes more difficult with decreasing grain size in the nanometer grain size range, even though the grain boundary sliding as the major process becomes facilitated. Roughly assessed m-value was in accord with this mechanism.

Abstract: Because of its excellent environmental resistance and cold-working capacity, beta titanium alloy Ti-15-3 has attracted more and more attention in aerospace manufacture industry. Another beta titanium alloy, Ti-29-13, has been recently developed for biomedical implant materials. The mechanical properties of three alloys including two β and one α+β are presented, particularly the characteristic of β alloy differing from that of α+β alloy. The high temperature deformation behaviors of two alloys are also presented. Excellent formability of Ti-15-3 highlights the metal sheet application in commercial and military airplane. Band structure in Ti-29-13 has been found. Thermalmechanical processing is carried out to reduce the band structure and improve the elongation.

Abstract: High-magnesium Al-Mg alloys are known to be sensitive to stress corrosion cracking involving environmental hydrogen, hydrogen invading from the corrosive environment. In this study, the behavior of the environmental hydrogen in Al-6%Mg and Al-8%Mg binary alloy sheets stretched by 10% during exposure to 3.5%NaCl solution has been investigated by means of hydrogen microprint technique. Microprint image is observed on one surface while the other surface is exposed to the solution. In both alloys, the silver particles corresponding to the sites where hydrogen atoms are emitted from the inside of the sheets are shown on the slip lines. It is shown that the hydrogen atoms are transported with moving dislocations in the alloys.

Abstract: The effect of the annealing atmosphere, the annealing temperature etc. on the hydrogen behavior in several Al-4% Mg alloys during heat treatment, was investigated. The results have shown that the hydrogen content in the as-cast slab is uniform, while the hydrogen content in the slab tends to be higher near the surface than in the interior after annealing. Such a tendency becomes more marked when annealing time is prolonged and Si and Fe content is lowered. The condensation of hydrogen near the surface can be seen only when it is annealed in a wet atmosphere. When annealed in a dry atmosphere, the hydrogen content near the surface becomes lower than in the center of the specimen. The hydrogen in Al-Mg alloys tends to be released to outside intrinsically at temperatures around 400°C and above. It is revealed that oxide film formed on the surface prevents the hydrogen from being released to outside.