Introduction

In the last three decades, many reviews on superplasticity have appeared. Some of these discuss all the main features of the phenomenon and its applications (see, e.g., monographs [1–7], reviews [8–15] and proceedings [16–23]), while others consider specific aspects, e.g., applications of superplasticity, development of new technological processes of metal working, mathematical modelling of the technological processes, properties of some superplastic materials, micromechanisms of deformation, etc. [24–31]. A recent book [6] as well as the five earlier publications [1–5] contain a comprehensive description of the metallurgical aspects of superplasticity and so there is no need to restate them in detail in the present volume. Reports on the various aspects of finite element modelling have also been published recently (see, e.g., [29–31]). Therefore, these aspects as well are not considered here in detail.