Internal stresses in planar random fibre aluminium composites. I. Tensile tests and cyclic Bauschinger experiments at room temperature and 77 K

Internal stresses in planar random alumina fibre reinforced aluminium with a range of fibre volume fractions have been studied theoretically and in tensile tests and cyclic Bauschinger experiments at room temperature and 77 K. The Eshelby S tensor for a planar random array of fibres is calculated, which allows the mean field model to be used to predict the internal stresses. The conventional Orowan-Wilson method of analysing cyclic Bauschinger experiments is modified, enabling the plastically and thermally induced matrix mean stresses to be separated. This analysis is applied to experimental results and the plastic mean stress and the initial magnitude of the thermal mean stress in the matrix are measured. The results for the thermal matrix mean stress are compared with measurements from monotonic flow curves and generally good agreement is observed. The measured thermal matrix mean stress in these composites is approximately independent of fibre volume fraction.