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Resistance to dislocation glide produced by intersections with other dislocations. Multiple active slip systems can form junctions and increase the density of obstacles. This is one mechanism of work hardening.

A junction produced when suitable partial dislocations on intersecting FCC slip planes react to form a low-energy sessile stair-rod segment. It obstructs further slip and can promote work hardening. Frank energetic favorability alone is not a complete calculation of junction geometry or mobility.

Plastic flow involving more than one active slip system. Interactions between dislocations on intersecting systems can give substantially faster work hardening than easy single slip.

Localization of tensile deformation into a narrowing region of a specimen. The onset depends on the competition between declining cross-sectional area and work hardening.

Use the two partials on each plane as obtained above. The four pairwise sums, in units of $a/6$, areThe shortest resultant gives the largest line-energy reduction in the $G{b}^2$ approximation:The initial summed squared magnitude is $a^2/3$ and the final value is $a^2/18$, a sixfold reduction in that part of the energy estimate.

The line of intersection of the two original planes is parallel toIts dot product with the resultant Burgers vector is zero, so the junction is edge in character. A plane containing both line and Burgers vector has normal $[100]$, rather than an FCC close-packed $\{111\}$ glide normal. The resulting stair-rod dislocation is therefore sessile for ordinary glide and can form a Lomer-Cottrell lock. It obstructs further dislocation motion and promotes work hardening.

This energetic comparison assumes comparable line lengths and elastic prefactors. Geometry, line character and stacking-fault geometry affect a complete junction-energy calculation, but the small resultant identifies the favorable candidate requested by the vector model.

The alloy shear yield stress can be roughly $70/0.78\simeq 90$ times the stated pure-aluminium critical resolved shear stress. Strengthening raises the stress required for dislocation glide rather than requiring homogeneous shearing of a perfect crystal.

These mechanisms can coexist. The numerical comparison is an order-of-magnitude comparison of shear strengths; it is not a conversion of the alloy's shear yield stress directly into a tensile yield stress.

A second slip system begins to operate as the tensile-axis rotation makes its resolved shear stress comparable to that on the primary system. Dislocations on intersecting planes interact much more strongly, giving the transition from easy single slip to rapid work hardening. The standard geometric estimate neglects differences between the evolving critical stresses of the two systems.

The primary direction is $\mathbf{s}\parallel [101]$. Single-slip shear carries the line joining the specimen ends, expressed in crystal coordinates, alongThe initial fundamental sector has $x<y<z$. Its first reached boundary is $x=y$, at $t=1$, giving $\mathbf{r}=[225]$. At that orientation $(\overline{1}11)[101]$ and $(1\overline{1}1)[011]$ have equal Schmid factors. Since the component perpendicular to the primary slip direction is unchanged by that shear, the length ratio follows directly:ThereforeThe corresponding logarithmic strain is $\ln (L/L_0)=0.2260$. This is an ideal equal-critical-stress geometric onset estimate. Real secondary slip can start earlier or later because of latent hardening, nonuniform deformation and grip constraints; the problem supplies no hardening law that would determine that shift.^[ref]

At small load the deformation is elastic: ${\epsilon }_{\parallel }=\sigma /E$, and, using isotropic elasticity with $E=2G(1+\nu )$, $\nu =0.30$ gives lateral contraction ${\epsilon }_{\perp }=-0.30{\epsilon }_{\parallel }$. At maximum load,For the specified slip system, the tensile direction is proportional to $(-2,-3,5)$, the slip direction to $(1,-1,1)$ and the plane normal to $(1,0,-1)$. Hence the Schmid factor isSchmid's law predicts glide when this reaches the critical resolved shear stress. Before that, unloading reverses the strain; after activation, glide produces permanent strain and may generate work hardening and additional slip. The supplied data do not fix the yield load. Neither the adjective “ultra-strong” nor $E/G$ supplies a critical shear stress or an absolute modulus. Other slip systems must also be checked before claiming which activates first. In particular, the specimen remains elastic through the maximum load if every relevant system stays below its activation threshold.

Irradiation softening occurs when irradiation removes pre-existing strengthening obstacles faster than it creates new ones. It is particularly plausible in an initially hardened alloy, rather than an initially soft annealed reference.

In a material strengthened by cold working, the starting dislocation density is high. Irradiation-generated point defects can assist dislocation climb, rearrangement and annihilation, reducing the contribution of work hardening. A schematic estimate iswhere $\mu$ is the shear modulus, $b$ the magnitude of the Burgers vector, ${\rho }_d$ the dislocation density, and the last two terms represent precipitate and irradiation-obstacle strengthening. It is an illustrative decomposition, not an exact additive law for every alloy. A sufficiently large decrease in the pre-existing contributions can exceed the increase in $\Delta {\sigma }_{\mathrm{irr}}$.

In a material strengthened by precipitation hardening, ballistic mixing can dissolve or disorder the original obstacles. Radiation-enhanced diffusion can change their composition or accelerate coarsening; increasing obstacle spacing can reduce strength. In an ordered alloy, irradiation-induced loss of order can also remove a strengthening contribution. None of these outcomes is inevitable: irradiation can instead create new strengthening precipitates.

The required conditions therefore include an appropriate initial microstructure, enough displacement dose to modify it, and a temperature and displacement dose rate at which obstacle removal or recovery can compete with new defect accumulation. Compare with an unirradiated specimen held for the same time at the same temperature to separate ordinary thermal aging from an irradiation effect.

A drop in yield strength or hardness need not restore ductility: cavities, helium embrittlement or localization of dislocation glide can coexist with softening. Conversely, an initially annealed steel may show strong irradiation hardening under the same exposure conditions.