The influence of the WC-Co composite microstructure model on stress field heterogeneity at the microstructure level: FEM based study

The paper is devoted to finite element method based study of stress field heterogeneity at microstructure level of two-phase cemented carbides. Special attention is put on investigation of influence of the microstructure model type on the stress field distributions. Two- and three-dimensional models of the microstructures have been generated. Moreover, two different representations of the microstructure have been considered. The first one assumes uniformly distributed cobalt phase forming continuous boundaries between tungsten carbide particles. The second one assumes that the cobalt phase shape and distribution are created in a way that allows for no differentiation of continuous boundaries between tungsten carbide grains. Finite element analyses have been carried out with different microstructure models. The results of the simulations are stress distributions in each phase of the material. Furthermore, a numerical homogenization has been conducted to investigate the phase properties’ influence on the effective elastic constants of the cemented carbide.