1. General

Hot forming plays a very important role in industrial manufacturing cycles: almost all metal parts begin by undergoing one or more hot forming operations. Some are used as they are (heavy plate, rails and sections, drop-forged parts), and it is therefore the hot forming that determines their structure and properties for use. Most are then cold-formed, in which case the structural (or textural) transformations resulting from hot forming can modify the conditions for this second series of operations. In some materials with a strong structural memory, such as titanium or zirconium alloys, they may remain in varying proportions right up to the finished product. Finally, hot forming operations can be used to influence the "architecture of the material", in which case they are referred to as thermomechanical treatments.

Studies of hot-forming metallurgy encounter the...