Quantification of damage evolution in a 7075 aluminum alloy using an acoustic emission technique

The use of acoustic emission for quantifying the microstructural damage evolution under tensile loading is studied for a 7075 aluminum alloy. First, the cracking of intermetallic particles present in the material was evaluated using interrupted tensile tests combined with digital image analysis of large optical image montages. Subsequent acoustic emission tests under tensile monotonic loading produced an in situ signature that correlated with the quantitative stereology results obtained destructively. Acoustic emission is a viable option for quantifying the evolution of microstructure damage in terms of particle cracking for the 7075 alloy.