Single-crystal elasto-viscoplasticity: application to texture evolution in polycrystalline metals at large strains

This paper develops a theory for the elastic-viscoplastic response of ductile single-crystals deforming by crystallographic slip within a framework that accounts for the laws of continuum thermodynamics. A special set of constitutive equations resulting from the general theory has been implemented in a finite-element computer program. The numerical capability is used to model the large deformation response of face-centered-cubic polycrystalline aggregates in which each finite element represents a single crystal; the polycrystalline aggregate is assumed to have an isotropic initial crystallographic texture. Numerical predictions from such a model of a polycrystal are shown to be in good agreement with the experimental results for the anisotropic stress-strain response and the evolution of crystallographic texture in some fundamental deformation modes on copper. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.