AbstractThe changes in structure and substructure occurring during homogenisation and hot rolling of an Al–5Mg alloy (AA 5083) have been investigated. It is shown that a homogenisation treatment is beneficial and that the resulting structure can be related to processing parameters. The results suggest that the substructure morphology is dependent upon the total strain, but this has not been quantified. The development of texture was also studied and it is shown to be almost invariant with temperature, but strongly strain dependent. The anisotropy so produced yielded plastic strain ratios that were found to be strongly dependent upon the rotated copper texture intensity. The deep drawing behaviour of the hot rolled sheet was investigated by employing cupping tests and it is shown that a relationship exists between the earing value and the subgrain size.MST/I086