Attenuation of ultrasound in severely plastically deformed nickel

Ultrasound attenuation was measured in nickel specimens of about 30mm diameter prepared using the high pressure torsion technique. The cold working process produced an equivalent shear strain increasing from zero at the center up to 1000% at the edge of the specimen. The fragmentation of the grains due to multiple dislocations led to an ultrafine microstructure with large angle grain boundaries. The mean value of the grain size distribution gradually decreased from ∼50μm at the center to 0.2μm at the edge. Laser pulses of 5ns were employed for the excitation of broadband ultrasound pulses covering the spectral range of 0.1–150MHz. The ultrasound pulses were measured from the opposite side of the specimen by means of an optical interferometer and a piezoelectric foil transducer in two experimental setups. The features of the detected signal forms are discussed. The absolute value of the attenuation decreases from the center to the edge of the specimen showing nearly linear frequency dependence. The variation of the phase velocity was measured in a 6mm-thick high pressure torsion nickel sample, revealing a velocity increase from the center to the edge.