Designing ultrastrong and thermally stable FeCrAl alloys with the fine-grained structure

Designing microstructurally stable FeCrAl alloys with excellent strength-ductility synergy is highly desir-able for their engineering applications.However,due to the preference nucleation of precipitates at grain boundaries(GBs),the improved precipitation strengthening of these alloys is usually accompanied by in-tergranular embrittlement.Here,we propose a novel thermomechanical processing route coupled with the Si alloying strategy via precipitation of coherent deformable Laves precipitates inside equiaxed fine-grains to achieve FeCrAl alloys with ultrahigh yield strength over∼992 MPa,excellent uniform elongation of∼7.6%at room temperature,and superior thermal stability at temperature∼1200℃.The Si alloying not only decreases the stacking fault energy of Laves precipitates favorable for their stacking-fault-mediated deformation but also hinders grain coarsening at 1200℃due to the Si-enrichment favorable for GB pin-ning effects.Our results prove the possibility of achieving the collaborative enhancement of mutually exclusive properties in alloys,such as strength-ductility-thermal stability via nanoprecipitation engineer-ing,and offer a promising route to prepare dispersion-strengthened materials.

Preliminary study on the fabrication of 14Cr-ODS FeCrAl alloy by powder forging

A simple powder forging process was presented herein to fabricate an Fe-14 Cr-4.5 Al-2 W-0.4 Ti-0.5 Y_(2)O_(3)ODS Fe Cr Al alloy.The forged alloy exhibits a high density that exceeds 97%of the theoretical density.The ODS alloy was investigated in terms of the residual porosity,morphology and phase structure of oxide nanoparticles,impact toughness and tensile properties.It was found that refined grains were obtained during powder forging.A residual porosity less than 1.1%has no impact on the precipitation of oxide nanoparticles.The average diameter of the oxide particles is 7.99 nm,with a number density of 2.75×10^(22)m^(-3).Almost all of the oxides are identified as orthorhombic YAl O3 particles.The refined grains and uniformly distributed oxide nanoparticles enable the alloy to show excellent mechanical strength and ductility below 700℃,and enable the ductile-to-brittle transition temperature to be close to room temperature.However,a slight decrease in strength at 1000℃and the Charpy upper shelf energy has been suggested to be due to the residual porosity.These results indicate that powder forging can be used as a promising technique for the fabrication of ODS alloys.

Influence of Cold-Rolling Reduction on Microstructure and Tensile Properties of Nuclear FeCrAl Alloy with Low Cr and Nb Contents

FeCrAl alloy is one of the most promising candidates as an accident-tolerant fuel(ATF)cladding material.Herein,the influence of cold-rolling(CR)reduction on microstructure and tensile properties of the as-annealed FeCrAl alloys,with low Cr and Nb contents,is systematically examined.With the increase in CR reduction,the grain size of FeCrAl alloy is obviously refined after annealing because the increase in stored deformation energy leads to enhanced recrystallization.However,the large CR reductions result in a severe mixed-grain microstructure,significantly reducing the uniform deformability of the FeCrAl alloy.The dislocation density of the as-annealed FeCrAl alloy decreases with the increase in CR reduction,except for the excessive CR reduction of 50%.Moreover,the Laves phases are crushed and dissolved during CR and annealing,as well as large amounts of refined Laves phases are found after large CR reductions.The pinning effect of the Laves phases can significantly improve the strength of FeCrAl alloy.Accordingly,the strengthening mechanisms of FeCrAl alloy consist of fine-grain strengthening,dislocation strengthening and precipitation strengthening.Finally,the FeCrAl alloy,with a CR reduction of 30%,achieves optimal tensile properties.This study can provide theoretical guidance for the industrial production of the FeCrAl alloy.

Formation of In-Situ Dispersion Strengthening Particles in Cast FeCrAl Alloy

In order to fabricate dispersion strengthened alloys strengthened by submicron-sized or nano-sized stable particles through casting routes, understanding of the formation process of dispersion strengthening particles in metal melt is of significance. Thus, nano NiO and TiO2 particles were selected as reactant to form in-situ dispersion strengthening oxide particles in Fe20Cr5Al alloy. Nano NiO and TiO2 particle powder was separately dispersed into nano Ni powder first. The loose mixed nano powder was added in Fe20CrSAl alloy melt when pouring the melt into mold. The study shows that nano NiO particles were not as effective as nano TiO2 particles in forming dispersion strengthening Al2O3 particles. The final diameters of dispersion strengthening oxide particles arose from nano TiO2 particles were of submicron. The Brownian collision of particles had caused this coarsening.

Dynamic Precipitation of Laves Phase and Grain Boundary Features in Warm Deformed FeCrAl Alloy:Effect of Zr

Warm compression deformation of Fe-13.5%Cr-4.7%Al-2.0%Mo-0.70%Nb-0.40Ta(wt%)(FeCrAl)and Fe-13.5%Cr-4.7%Al-2.0%Mo-0.45%Nb-0.40Ta-0.11Zr(wt%)(FeCrAl-Zr)ferritic stainless steel was performed by a thermal simulation machine Gleeble 3800 at 600°C and strain rates of 0.01-10 s^(-1).Before deformation,all the samples were solution-annealed for 2 h at 1150°C for FeCrAl alloy and 1250°C for FeCrAl-Zr alloy.The strain rate has little or no effect on peak stress,and the precipitates in matrix or grain boundary precipitates(GBPs)have no difference in the samples deformed at the strain rate 0.01 s^(-1)and 1 s^(-1)both in FeCrAl and FeCrAl-Zr alloys.The addition of Zr increased the proportion of low-angle grain boundaries(LAGBs).The Laves phase in FeCrAl alloy precipitated uniform in the matrix,while in FeCrAl-Zr alloy Laves phase precipitated at grain boundary and formed GBP.The LAGBs andΣ3 coincident site lattice(CSL)grain boundary both increased in FeCrAl-Zr alloy,which possessed some beneficial properties such as high-temperature creep resistance to the Fe-Cr-Al alloy.More interesting,twins were created by warm deformation,which was difficult in typical bcc ferrite alloy.These results could be expected to provide guidance for subsequent warm working processes for the alloy.

Recrystallization and mechanical properties of cold-rolled FeCrAl alloy during annealing

The efect of cold rolling and annealing on the microstructure and properties of an Fe-13Cr-4.5Al-2.2Mo-1.1Nb alloy was investigated.The results showed that the recrystallization rate increased with increasing annealing temperature and rolling reduction.Recrystallization kinetics was constructed based on Johnson-Mehl-Avrami-Kolmogorov equation.The apparent activation energies of recrystallization were 161.385,144.770,and 95.362 kJ/mol for the samples with 30%,50%,and 70%cold-rolling reduction,respectively.With the cold-rolling reduction increasing,the textureγfber partly changed to<100>//ND.After annealing,γfber of the alloy with 30%thickness reduction retained,the subgrains disappeared through merging,and the proportion of coincident site lattice grain boundaries increased and became more continuous.30%cold-rolling reduction alloy annealed at 730°C for 120 min not only possessed relatively high yield strength(YS)of^730 MPa and ultimate tensile strength(UTS)of^880 MPa,but also exhibited elongation of^16%at room temperature.After annealing at 730°C for 120 min,70%cold-rolled alloy has fner and more uniform grain,with higher elongation of^22%,YS of^615 MPa and UTS of^774 MPa.The mechanism of mechanical properties diference was explained according to Schmid factor analysis.These results provided an efective way for tuning strength and ductility of FeCrAl alloy.

Cathodic micro-arc electro-deposition of ZrO_2 coatings in an aqueous solution containing colloidal particles

By a novel technique-cathodic micro-arc electro-deposition (CMED), ZrO_2coatings were deposited on an FeCrAl alloy. Experimental results show that the necessary conditionsfor obtaining ZrO_2 coatings are to apply a pulse peak voltage over a critical value and addmoderate amounts of ZrO_2 colloidal particles and Zr(NO_3)_4 in the aqueous solution. Theas-deposited coatings are porous because hydrogen, water, and other vapors are generated andreleased from the coatings to the solution during the spark reaction. The coatings containmonoclinic and tetragonal crystalline ZrO_2 with certain degree of amorphous structure. Theprocessing parameters and mechanism of CMED were discussed.

Effect of niobium content on irradiation microstructure and hardening in FeCrAl-based alloys

Iron-chromium-aluminum(FeCrAl)alloys with different content of niobium(Nb)—0,0.4 wt%,0.8 wt%,and 1.2 wt%—were designed and prepared.All samples were then irradiated with 2.4 MeV Fe^(2+)ion to the dose of 1 and 15 displacements per atom(dpa)at 400℃.The formations of dislocation loops induced by self-ion irradiation in these alloys were investigated by transmission electron microscopy(TEM).Nano-indentation tests were used to assess the hardness and irradiation hardening of samples.For the samples before irradiation,the(Fe,Cr)_(2)(Nb,Mo)Laves phases density and the nano-indentation hardness increased with increasing Nb content of the samples.After irradiation to 1 and 15 dpa,both of a/2<111>and a<100>dislocation loops were produced but no voids orα’phase were found in all samples.With increasing Nb content of the samples,the size of dislocation loops increased first and then decreased,while the total volume number density decreased and then increased.The fraction of a<100>dislocation loops increased first and then decreased with increasing Nb content,and increased with increasing irradiation dose.Dislocation networks and the amorphization of the Laves phases were observed in the samples with irradiation dose of 15 dpa.Irradiation hardening of Nb free samples was two to four times that of Nb containing samples,and the irradiation hardening increased with increasing Nb content of Nb containing samples.The experimental results indicate that the increase of Nb content in Fe Cr Al alloys can increase the density of Laves phases,leading to the decrease of Mo content and increase of Cr content in the matrix.The competition between the two types of solutes affects the nucleation and growth of the dislocation loops.

Delayed plasticity during spherical nanoindentation of an iron-chromium-aluminum alloy:Effect of ferric ion irradiation

Spherical nanoindentation of an iron-chromium-aluminum alloy was conducted to study the effect of ferric-ion(Fe 3+)irradiation on the time-dependent plasticity behavior in the surface layers of this alloy.It was observed that the initiation of plasticity by the appearance of displacement burst or“pop-in”event occurred after a period of waiting time in the apparent elastic regime and that Fe^(3+)irradiation at 360°C and up to∼0.5 displacements per atom could make it happen under the lower applied loads but with a reduced magnitude.Through the experimental data,an activation volume and activation energy were extracted for the delayed plasticity.The results show that Fe^(3+)-irradiation significantly reduced its acti-vation volume from∼3.05 b 3 to∼1.75 b 3(where b=Burgers vector),but slightly increased its activation energy from∼0.65 to∼0.71 eV.On the other hand,high-resolution scanning transmission electron mi-croscopy observations reveal that the irradiation at the elevated temperature created interstitial atom pair onto the(100)habit plane that can serve as the nucleation site of a100dislocation loop while elim-inating the pre-existing dislocations.Consequently,it is indicated that heterogeneous nucleation of the dislocation loop was predominant in the delayed plasticity initiation of this alloy and that the nucleation of the interstitial-type dislocation loop was involved due to Fe^(3+)-irradiation.