Abstract
Very sharp deformation textures, with single maxima of more than 50x random centred on the rotated cube component ({001}<110>), were produced by submitting a non-oriented electrical steel sheet to various sequences of cross-rolling. The cold rolled sheets were subsequently annealed at 730ºC for 3 min. The resulting recrystallization textures were much weaker than the cold rolling textures, displaying maxima of about 5x random at locations some distance away from the {001}<110> cross rolling component.Due to the very sharp character of the rolling texture, the conventional low and high stored energy nucleation mechanisms were effectively prevented from operating. Thus orientation selection could only take place by the selective growth of nuclei external to the dominant rolling component. Quantitative analysis of the experimental ODFs revealed that the rolling and recrystallization components are related by Σ27 (31.6º<110>) and Σ7c (38.2º<111>) coincidence site lattice (CSL) orientation relations. Simulations of the annealing texture on the basis of random nucleation and combined Σ27-Σ7c selective growth produced reasonable agreement between the predictions and the experimental results.