Al-Li alloy material is the fastest developing advanced lightweight structural material in aerospace materials in recent years, which has many excellent comprehensive properties such as low density, high elastic modulus, high specific strength and stiffness, good fatigue performance, good corrosion resistance and weldability. Replacing conventional high-strength aluminum alloy with it can reduce the structural quality by 10%~20% and increase the stiffness by 15%~20%. Compared with composite materials, the new Al-Li alloy has advantages in reducing weight, controlling risks and reducing production, processing and maintenance costs. The development of new Al-Li alloy and advanced structural design have become an important technical means to support the development of a new generation of aircraft. Therefore, it shows a broad application prospect in the aerospace field.
As an important structural material in aerospace field, Al-Li alloy has been paid more and more attention by western countries. Now the third generation Al-Li alloy has been applied to the manufacture of large commercial passenger aircraft, which has become an important trend of aircraft development in the future. However, at present, the new Al-Li alloy mainly depends on foreign suppliers, which not only has high cost, but also can not be supported by related key technologies such as sheet metal and heat treatment. Therefore, it is an important direction for the future development of aluminum-lithium alloys in China to independently develop and study new aluminum-lithium alloys with high strength and high damage tolerance.