SK...
CAUTION... about 'make-it-yourself' wrought product. Most likely Your customer asked for their part to be 'made-from' a specific aluminum-bronze spec bar.
The OEMs for this material have the process 'nailed'... YOU will NOT. The grain structure, orientation, porosity, mechanical allowables, toughness, heat-treat, etc... will be a crap shoot.
ALTHOUGH IT IS TEMPTING to make Your own... DON'T DO IT... get the right material with certification documents from a reliable source and make a reliable part.
No-Sh*t War Story. I was at a welding conference ~15 years ago. A welding scientist was investigating a novel welding process for titanium 6Al-4V plate. He made his presentation and I was caught off guard by the weld-joint tensile and bend 'numbers'. Being an engineer [NOT SCIENTIST] I wanted to know what material specification the plate was made/procured-to for his testing, IE: ASTM, AMS, etc. His reply was shocking... to save big-$$ buying a certified 'as-rolled' Ti-6Al-4V plate... he used a donated [free] short/fat titanium 6Al-4V bar.
Huhhh? Oh kaaaay?? HOW???
He had 'the lab' heat the bar in their research air oven... then the lab crushed it down flat under a massive hydraulic press to 'make the plate'... then they annealed it. Then he machined the specimens and welded them and tested the welds.
Huuhhhhh OOOOoooH H***LLLL NOOOooooo... I argued back that his lab had made a non-specification 'flat forging that looked like a plate'... with none of the surface features, grain, metallurgy or required raw-material testing to validate it to any 'plate standard' [properties]. In other words he had tested his novel weld-process on a unique piece of material... forged, not rolled, plate... that would-not... never-could-be... reproduced by any reputable wrought processor.
This really, REALLY bothered me DEEPLY as an engineer who relies on authoritative material certifications... hence predictable mechanical and physical [etc] allowables for the materials I specify to make airworthy parts.
Regards, Wil Taylor
o Trust - But Verify!
o For those who believe, no proof is required; for those who cannot believe, no proof is possible. [variation, Stuart Chase]
o Unfortunately, in science what You 'believe' is irrelevant. ["Orion", HBA forum]
o Only fools and charlatans know everything and understand everything." -Anton Chekhov