Microstructural evolution and microsegregation in directional solidification of hypoeutectic Al−Cu alloy:A comparison between experimental data and numerical results obtained via phase-field model

The objective of the work is focused on predictions of microsegregation,solidification speed,dendritic arm spacings and dendrite morphology by phase-field model.The numerical results were compared with experimental data.The experimental values for cooling rates and effective partition coefficient were adopted during calculations.The results of microsegregation through phase-field model show excellent agreement with the experimental data.Such excellent agreement is because cooling rates,effective partition coefficient and back-diffusion of solute are considered in the model.For solidification speed,the calculation results show good agreement with the experimental data.Tertiary dendritic arm spacing calculated with phase-field model is compared with experimental data.The results show good agreement between them.The dendrite arm spacing varies with position because high cooling rates are responsible for the refinement effect on microstructure.Finally,two-dimensional simulation produced a dendrite that is similar to that found in the experiment.

Mechanism of heterogeneous distribution of Cr-containing dispersoids in DC casting 7475 aluminum alloy

The actual effective partition coefficients of Mg and Cr in a cross-section of a dendrite arm in a direct-chill(DC)-casting ingot of 7475 aluminum alloy are obtained.Meanwhile,by analyzing the microstructure,the mechanism of the heterogeneous distribution of E(Al_(18)Mg_(3)Cr_(2))dispersoids in this DC ingot is revealed.The results show that the actual effective partition coefficients of Mg and Cr are 0.650 and 1.392,respectively,and they describe the heterogeneous distributions of Mg and Cr along the direction of radius of the cross-section of the dendrite arm of the alloy.After homogenization treatment at 470℃ for 24 h,Mg diffuses uniformly,but Cr hardly diffuses.Both the concentrations of Mg and Cr and the sites of heterogeneous nucleation in the alloy are the determinants of the formation of E dispersoids simultaneously.The heat treatment at 250℃ for 72 h provides a large number of the sites of heterogeneous nucleation of the formation of fine E dispersoids that will be formed in the center of the cross-section during the subsequent heat treatment at higher temperature.

Microstructure and Tensile Properties of a Nb–Mo Microalloyed 6.5Mn Alloy Processed by Intercritical Annealing and Quenching and Partitioning

The transformation behavior, microstructural evolution and mechanical properties were compared in a coldrolled Nb–Mo microalloyed 6.5Mn alloy after intercritical annealing（IA） and quenching and partitioning（Q ＆ P）,respectively. The thermodynamic calculation and theoretical analysis were used to determine the optimal heat treatment parameters. The Q ＆ P samples exhibited relatively higher strength with relatively low ductility, mainly due to the hard martensite matrix, which resulted in continuous yielding behavior upon loading, whereas the IA samples showed the significantly improved ductility, which benefited from the more sufficient transformation-induced plasticity（TRIP） effects and the softer ultrafine ferrite matrix. The dependence of yield point elongation（YPE） of IA samples on grain size demonstrated that the YPE value was in the reverse proportional relationship to the average grain size, which agreed well with theoretical analysis.