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Additive manufacturing (AM) is a new and promising production methodology adept at producing complex geometries, which can be optimized for lower weight and enhanced capabilities. The material properties of these additive components are dictated by the microstructures developed during processing, with a high sensitivity to grain structure and associated anisotropy. With this new processing modality comes the added difficulty of understanding the thermodynamics and kinetic mechanisms that dictate the evolution of microstructure. This research addresses the unique thermal conditions present in AM and the pathways for grain refinement in nanofunctionalized aluminum alloys. The Al-Ta system, in which Al3Ta intermetallic compounds are demonstrated to have substantial grain refining capacity, are the focus of this study. The grain size is shown to be reduced relative to pure aluminum by 1000X when tantalum is added at 1 vol%. The effectiveness of the Al3Ta intermetallic is dictated by the crystallography and availability of the inoculant phase under AM conditions.

International audience; Fatigue crack nucleation in crystalline materials typically develops due to highly localized cyclic slip. During a fatigue cycle, reverse slip differs locally from slip in the forward direction particularly in precipitate-containing materials such as superalloys. In this paper we report the first direct measurements of irreversibility at the scale of individual slip bands by high-resolution digital image correlation (DIC) in a polycrystalline nickel-based superalloy. Quantitative measurements of the slip irreversibility are challenging for regions of material that have a size that captures the microstructure and its variability. High spatial resolution at the nanometer scale during experimental measurements is needed to observe slip localization during deformation. Moreover, large fields are also needed to obtain the material response over statistically representative populations of microstructural configurations. Recently, high resolution scanning electron microscope (SEM) digital image correlation (DIC) has been extended for quantitative analysis of discontinuities induced by slip events using the Heaviside-DIC method. This novel method provides quantitative measurements of slip localization at the specimen surface. In this paper, the Heaviside-DIC method is used to measure slip irreversibility and plastic strain accumulation in a nickel-based superalloy. The method detects bands with high levels of irreversibility early in cycling that ultimately form fatigue cracks upon further cycling. The local microstructural configurations that induce large amounts of plasticity and slip irreversibility are correlated to crack nucleation locations.

Micro-tensile specimens of nickel-based superalloy oligocrystals were tested in-situ in an scanning electron microscope in transmission mode (TSEM) enabling observation of dislocations. The dynamics of dislocation motion during tensile loading were captured and correlated with the measured intermittencies during plastic flow recorded by high load- and temporal-resolution sensors. This investigation in particular focused on the dislocation behavior near twin boundaries with different slip configurations. A multiplicity of deformation mechanisms at the dislocation scale were observed within individual slip bands, including precipitate shearing, dislocation decorrelation and antiphase boundary-coupled shearing. These processes affect strain localization near twin boundaries and provide new defect-level insights on plastic localization and fatigue crack initiation in these alloys.

Based on simulations of tensile tests, the macroscopic stiffness and strength of the α phase of Ti-6Al-4V are estimated. Sets of virtual samples are instantiated using characterization data from three-dimensional electron back-scattered diffraction (EBSD) scans collected with the TriBeam microscope and local properties extracted from in situ loading high-energy x-ray diffraction (HEXD) experiments. The simulations use a crystal-scale finite element framework to compute the mechanical response of the virtual samples under tensile loading. From the simulation data, mechanical properties are extracted from volume elements ranging in size from a fraction of the gage section to its entire length. To detect macroscopic yield, a flood-fill algorithm is used to identify a zone of plastically deformed finite elements extending through a volume element. Trends in the estimated properties as functions of the volume element size are examined. The lower bound of volume element size necessary to replicate experimentally measured macroscale properties is indicated. The technique and results provide a guideline for estimating macroscale property values in components designed with size smaller than the lower bound due to constraint.

The microstructural configurations that favor early strain localization and fatigue crack initiation at intermediate and high temperature (400 °C–650 °C) have been investigated using novel experimental techniques, including high resolution digital image correlation and transmission scanning electron microscopy. Cyclic fatigue experiments in the high and low cycle fatigue regimes have been performed on a Rene 88DT polycrystalline nickel-base superalloy at temperatures up to 650 °C and compared to previous fatigue results obtained from tests in the very high cycle fatigue regime. Competing failure modes are observed along with an inversion in the temperature fatigue life dependence of fatigue strength from the low to high cycle fatigue regime. Oxidation-assisted processes are dominant at high applied stresses while cyclic plastic localization and accumulation govern fracture at low applied stresses. In addition, a second competing mode exists in the high and very high cycle fatigue regime from non-metallic inclusions as compared to internal intrinsic initiation sites. The grain-scale features that exhibit strain localization and crack initiation were investigated in detail. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM), transmission scanning electron microscopy (TSEM) and electron channeling contrast imaging have been conducted on samples removed from targeted regions with microstructural configurations that favor crack initiation to characterize the associated dislocation sub-structure and its evolution with temperature. Plasticity is observed to be less localized during cyclic loading at high temperature compared to room temperature. The microstructural features that drive initiation across the temperature range investigated are: twin-parent grains pairs that are at the upper end of the size distribution, are oriented for near maximum elastic modulus mismatch, and have high stresses along planes parallel to the twin boundaries.

The equiaxed microstructure of Ti-6Al-4V contains nominally 10µm to 15µm α -phase grains. Depending on processing, these fine grains may aggregate into large, millimeter-scale regions of similar crystallographic orientation. These so-called microtextured regions are detrimental to quasi-static and fatigue properties. Their presence may facilitate the formation of long-range strain localization—bands of plastic strain that traverse grain boundaries and terminate at the boundaries of the microtextured region which compromises strength and ductility—and can cause early fatigue crack nucleation. Furthermore, the low angle boundaries within microtextured regions offer little resistance to crack growth, and corresponding increases in crack growth rates have been observed in these regions. Despite significant research into the effects of microtextured regions on macroscopic properties, there is still a lack of rigorous definition of what constitutes a microtextured region. To this end, we present a computational study in which deformation simulations are performed to study the effect of the intensity and character of microtexture on the localization of plastic strain. Mean orientation and intensity of microtexture are parameterized in a suite of simulations. Simulations indicate that strain localization is facilitated both by the presence of some amount of orientation spread within a microtextured region, and further by the intensity of microtexture in neighboring regions. Simulations are further discussed with respect to high resolution experimental measurements of intragrain strain in a microtextured Ti-6Al-4V specimen, which exhibit similar mechanical trends.