Comparison study on microstructure
Comparison study on microstructure
Materials Characterization
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matchar
A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T
Keywords: To better understand the structure-mechanical properties relation of additively manufactured Ti-6Al-4V (Ti64)
Titanium alloys alloys, a comparison study was performed on Ti64 alloys fabricated by powder-based selective laser melting
Selective laser melting (SLM) and sintering methods. It is found that the SLM Ti64 alloy has prior β grains filled with (lath α + needle
Spark plasma sintering α′) structure. While Ti64 alloys sintered over and below β → α transformation temperature have widmanstatten
Microstructures
α + β and lamellar α + β structure, respectively. The SLM Ti64 alloy has higher strength and hardness than
Mechanical properties
sintered alloys, but possesses similar Young's modulus to the spark plasma sintered alloy. The mechanisms
leading to the different mechanical properties are discussed based on phase compositions and contents. The
results suggest that SLM Ti64 alloys potentially have better mechanical performance compared with those
fabricated by conventional sintering methods.
⁎
Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (B. Chen), [email protected] (X. Lin).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matchar.2020.110358
Received 16 February 2020; Received in revised form 21 April 2020; Accepted 27 April 2020
Available online 30 April 2020
1044-5803/ © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
the scanning speed, the powder bed changed from continuous melting
into partial melting due to insufficient laser energy input. Qiu et al. [12]
surveyed the anisotropy behaviors of SLM-fabricated Ti64 in the ver-
tical laser deposition direction and the horizontal orientation. The
tensile test results indicated that the horizontal direction possessed a
higher UTS (~1200 MPa) as well as a limited elongation, while the
vertical direction exhibited a lower UTS (~1100 MPa) and generally
good elongation. In addition, even after post hot isostatic pressing, the
anisotropy phenomenon still existed. Kumar et al. [13] compared AM
Ti64 parts under different laser scan rotation angles (67°–90°). The
results suggested that 67° angle suppressed the formation of prior β
grains, resulting in the houndstooth-shape of melt zone boundaries
which would be the crack initiation during deformation. Those results
illustrated that individual factors had effect on the materials processing,
and eventually on textures and mechanical properties. However, it is
difficult to distinguish the specific contribution of the processing factors
to the performances. More efforts should be done to understand the
relationships among process parameters, microstructure and mechan-
ical properties of AM Ti64 parts. Fig. 1. Morphology of raw Ti64 powders.
Another way to better understand AM Ti64 alloys is a comparison of
the microstructure and mechanical properties of Ti64 processed by AM wavelength of 1070 nm, a maximum power of 200 W in continuous
and conventional methods. From recent review papers [3,14] on AM Ti laser mode as well as a spot size of 70 μm. At first, the raw Ti64
alloys, it seems that as-built SLM Ti64 alloys can have improved tensile powders of 5 kg were loaded into a container. And then, the chamber
strength up to over 1200 MPa compared with those fabricated by temperature was heated up to 373 K with a vacuum of ~1 Pa in the
conventional casting and sintering methods. However, it is unable to building room. Finally, the sample was produced with a laser power of
reach the conclusion that SLM Ti64 alloys have better mechanical 200 W, a scanning speed v of 1000 mm·s−1, a thickness of 30 μm layer,
properties because there are great scatterings in the tensile strength a hatch spacing (h) of 105 μm (Fig. 2c). Each layer scanning trace that
(960–1269 MPa) and elongation (1.4–10.2%) of SLM Ti64 [3]. More- followed a zigzag pattern was rotate 67° one by one with an alternate
over, since distinct raw Ti64 powders were used in SLM and conven- continuous laser mode.
tional processing methods, the difference in alloy compositions and
powder morphology would produce discrepancy in properties. There-
fore, a direct comparison between AM and conventional methods is 2.2. Microstructural characterization
greatly demanded.
In this study, we utilized the same powders to fabricate Ti64 alloys The as-fabricated Ti64 alloy samples were machined by electric
by SLM and some typical sintering methods. The density, micro- spark cutting to designed bulks for a series of tests including density
structure and mechanical performance were characterized to figure out measurements, microstructural characterization and mechanical
the mechanism of discrepancy in mechanical properties. The results testing. The density was measured by the Archimedes method for more
suggested that α′/α, widmanstatten and α + β structures formed under than three times and an average value was achieved. Bulk samples were
different processes. The relationship of processing parameters, micro- polished and then etched by a solution of 5 ml of HF, 10 ml HNO3 and
structures and mechanical properties will be discussed. 85 ml HF [15]. After that, the microstructure characterization of Ti64
bulks was performed via scanning electron microscopy (SEM, TESCAN
2. Experiment VEGA 3 LMU, 3 nm/30 kV, 127 eV). Energy dispersive spectrometer
(EDS) and electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD) characterizations
2.1. Materials and fabrication methods were performed in a double focused ion beam system (Helios NanoLab
G3 UC). The scanning step sizes for EBSD were 0.1 μm for the SLM-built
In this work, the commercially available gas atomized Ti64 powders Ti64 alloy, 0.2 μm for the HP-manufactured Ti64 sample and 1 μm for
(53–103 μm supplied by Sino-Euro Materials Technologies of Xi'an Co., the SPS-manufactured Ti64 alloy, respectively. The nanoscale micro-
LTD.) were used as the raw material (Fig. 1) for hot pressing (HP), spark structure of the SLM sample fabricated by ion thinning (Leica RES102)
plasma sintering (SPS) and selective laser melting (SLM). In the HP was observed by a high-resolution transmission electron microscopy
process, 45 g powders were poured into a graphite die with external (TEM, FEI Talos F200X TEM, 200 kV). The crystallographic structure
diameter of 100 mm and internal diameter of 30 mm (Fig. 2a). Then the and phases were analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD, Shimadzu poly-
Ti64 powders was sintered in HP (a maximum load of 3 × 104 kg) at crystalline), using Cu Ka (λ = 1.54 Å) radiation with a power of 3 kW.
sintering temperature of 1195 K for 1 h at a pressure of 30 MPa and a The scan speed was 2.8°·min−1. The elements contents of oxygen, hy-
vacuum of 4.3 × 10−2 Pa. drogen and nitrogen were measured by LECO ONH836.
In the SPS process, the raw powder, 127 g Ti64 powders was first
loaded into a graphite die with external diameter of 76 mm and internal 2.3. Mechanical properties
diameter of 30 mm (Fig. 2b). After that, the raw powder was prepressed
and put into the SPS (LABOX-330, Japan) sintering room with a va- Room temperature tensile tests were conducted on a microcomputer
cuum of ~0.5 Pa. The sintering temperature was 1273 K and keeping control electronic universal testing machine (INSTRON 3382, US) at a
time was 30 min (50 K·s−1 heated to 773 K, 30 K·s−1 heated to 1073 K, strain rate of 10−4 s−1. The tested samples were machined to dog-bone-
and then 20 K·s−1 heated to 1213 K, finally 10 K·s−1 heated into shaped specimens with 40 mm in length, 2 mm in thickness, 20 mm in
1273 K). During sintering, the vacuum was lowered to be < 0.1 Pa. The gauge length and 4 mm in gauge width. In hardness testes, the polished
sample was cooled down in the furnace for about 4 h. The applied samples were tested on a micro/macro automatic hardness testing
pressure during SPS was constantly held on 30 MPa. system (LECO, US) with a load of 300 N keeping for 13 s. The hardness
In the SLM process, the SLM machine AM250 supplied by RENIS- test was repeated ~50 times randomly on the surface with a diagonal
HAW Co. UK was used. It was equipped with a SPI laser system with a length ~40 μm of a diamond indentation shape and the average value
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 2. Illustration of Ti64 processing methods: (a) HP, (b) SPS, (c) SLM.
3.1. Microstructure
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 4. SEM of SLM-fabricated Ti64 alloy: (a) 3D microstructure as-manufactured Ti64 via SLM and Z presenting the laser decomposition direction. (b–c) the X-Z
plane, (d–e) Y-Z plane and (f–i) X-Y plane. Short orange arrows indicate voids. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred
to the web version of this article.)
Table 1
Density and phase size of as-built Ti64 alloys fabricated by different processes.
Process Density (g·cm−3) Relative density (%) Size
crystal filled with full α′ growing along the Z axis, which is due to the voids with submicron size in the as-fabricated SLM Ti64 alloy (marked
epitaxial grain growth dominating on the bottom of the melt pool and by orange arrows in Fig. 4c–e and g–h), which should be owing to the
the elongated β grains oriented towards the center of the melt pool immersion gas and its shrinking during rapid consolidation. In addition,
[19,24]. Moreover, the martensite orientation rotates 30–60° at each unfused powder particles are occasionally observed and they lead to
adjacent scan area (Fig. 4f and g). Meanwhile, there are many closed broad gaps (as shown in Fig. 4h and i), which may be attributed to the
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 6. SEM of HP-manufactured Ti64 alloy at different magnifications. (b) and (c) are the box area in (a) and (b), respectively.
Fig. 7. EBSD of SLM-built Ti64 alloy: (a) 3D model of as-built Ti64 via SLM with bond contrast. (b–d) IPF of as-made Ti64 by SLM at different orientation.
occasional coarse powder particles and the comparatively low laser SPS temperature of ~1273 K over the β → α transformation tempera-
density [9]. The defects of voids and unfused powders may lead to the ture (~1263 K [18,22,25]). While, the HP alloy (Fig. 6a–c) is a typical
decrease of density. Thus, the densities of as-built Ti64 alloys are α + β lamellar double-phase structure. The width and length of the α
measured and the results are listed in Table 1. It is seen that the density laths are ~3 μm and ~30 μm, respectively. β laths with width in sub-
and relative density of SLM-built Ti64 alloy are slightly smaller than micron scale exist at the boundaries of α laths. Such morphology is a
those of the two alloys by SPS and HP. It is thus deduced that the small result of sintering temperature in α + β zone and the comparatively
pores (Fig. 4c–i) and small amount of cracks (Fig. 4h and i) in SLM Ti64 slow cooling down rate.
do not have obvious effect on density. The EBSD results of SLM-built Ti64 samples are displayed in Fig. 7.
The SPS-manufactured Ti64 alloy (Fig. 5) has widmanstatten Due to the high cooling rate of the SLM process, a sufficient driving
structure that consists of long α laths inside prior β. The prior β size, or force is yielded to form full α/α′ laths structure [26]. It can be observed
the grain size is as large as ~150 μm because of the comparatively high that there is a similar orientation of α′ inside the prior β boundary,
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 8. EBSD of as-built Ti64 via SPS and HP respectively: (a) and (b) IPF of α phase in SPS and HP. (c) IPF of β phase in HP.
Fig. 9. TEM of SLM-fabricated Ti64 alloy: (a) Dark field image. (b) Bright field and (c) SAED of α in (a). (d–f) Elements distribution in (a). (d) Ti element. (e) Al
element. (f) V element.
Table 2 image of the HP-fabricated Ti64 alloy shows that α laths generally
The O, N, H element content of as-built Ti64 by different methods. elongate along the α growth direction (Fig. 8b). However, there seems
Process O content (wt%) N content (wt%) H content (wt%)
to be a 〈111〉 orientation of elongated β (Fig. 8c), which is probably
caused by the axial load pressure during consideration.
SPS 0.14 0.012 0.0016 The TEM microstructure of the SLM-fabricated Ti64 alloy is shown
HP 0.15 0.030 0.0020 in Fig. 9. The bright field transmission electron micrographs (Fig. 9a
SLM 0.22 0.039 0.0066
and b) illustrate that there are many laths with different lengths in
different direction. The selected area electron diffraction (SAED) of the
while the orientation changes in adjacent layers, due to the afore- marked circle area in Fig. 9b reveals the HCP crystal structure with an
mentioned 67° rotation of scan path in each layer. Moreover, no pre- interplanar spacing of 0.2648 nm along {1010} (Fig. 9c). This value is
ferred orientation of α′ laths is observed in the inverse polar figure (IPF) slightly larger than that of α-Ti, namely 0.2555 nm, possibly due to the
images of as-built Ti64 via SLM (Fig. 7b–d). In addition, the prior β lattice distortion caused by the stress and defects during consolidation
grains along the non-laser deposition direction appear to be in a co- [27]. However, it is difficult to distinguish the α′ from α via SAED result
lumnar crystal state (Fig. 7b–d), which is due to the epitaxial grain because of the similar HCP crystal lattice constant, while there are a
growth along the central of the melt pool during SLM consolidation subtle change in c/a values of α′ (1.58) and α (1.59–1.6) respectively
[19]. The IPF image of SPS-manufactured Ti64 emerges a state of coarse [13,28]. An EDS mapping analysis was performed at the area corre-
columnar α without a preferred orientation (Fig. 8a). While the IPF sponded to the image (Fig. 9a) and the elements (Ti, Al and V)
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 11. SEM of tensile fracture in as-built Ti64 by SLM: (a) the whole fracture image and (b) the magnification box area in (a). (c) Cracks in as-built Ti64. (d) A brittle
fracture area. (e) A selected magnification area in (d). (f) The specific magnification area in (c). (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure, the reader
is referred to the web version of this article.)
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Fig. 12. SEM of tensile broken area in SPS-fabricated Ti64 alloys: (a) The mixed brittle and ductile broken area. (b) The magnification box area in (a). (c) The
interface between ductile and transgranular broken area. (d) The ductile broken area.
Table 3
Mechanical properties of as-built Ti64 via different methods.
Process Tensile properties Hardness Reference
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Q. Yan, et al. Materials Characterization 164 (2020) 110358
Data availability
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