Development of a multi-pass facility for equal-channel angular pressing to high total strains

A multi-pass facility was fabricated for equal-channel angular (ECA) pressing which gave a total strain of approximately 5 on a single passage through the die. Experiments on high purity aluminum show that, when comparisons are made at the same total strains, both the hardness and the evolution of the microstructure are identical when using the multi-pass facility or when repetitively pressing samples through a standard die containing a single shearing plane.