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Microstructural development in DED stainless steels: applying welding models to elucidate the impact of processing and alloy composition

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Abstract

Austenitic stainless steel microstructures produced by directed energy deposition (DED) are analogous to those developed during welding, particularly high energy density welding. To better understand microstructural development during DED, theories of microstructural evolution, which have been established to contextualize weld microstructures, are applied in this study to microstructural development in DED austenitic stainless steels. Phenomenological welding models that describe the development of oxide inclusions, compositional microsegregation, ferrite, matrix austenite grains, and dislocation substructures are utilized to clarify microstructural evolution during deposition of austenitic stainless steels. Two different alloys, 304L and 316L, are compared to demonstrate the broad applicability of this framework for understanding microstructural development during the DED process. Despite differences in grain morphology and solidification mode for these two alloys (which can be attributed to compositional differences), similar tensile properties are achieved. It is the fine-scale compositional segregation and dislocation structures that ultimately determine the strength of these materials. The evolution of microsegregation and dislocation structures is shown to be dependent on the rapid solidification and thermomechanical history of the DED processing method and not the composition of the starting material.

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Acknowledgements

T.R.S. gratefully acknowledges support from the UC Davis Campus Executive Fellowship from Sandia National Laboratories. W. York, A. Gardea, and S. Vitale are thanked for metallographic specimen preparation support. This paper describes objective technical results and analysis. Any subjective views or opinions that might be expressed in the paper do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Department of Energy or the United States Government. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-mission laboratory managed and operated by National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC., a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International, Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration under contract DE-NA-0003525.

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  1. University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, 95616, USA

    Thale R. Smith

  2. Sandia National Laboratories, Livermore, CA, 94550, USA

    Thale R. Smith, Joshua D. Sugar & Chris San Marchi

  3. University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, 92697, USA

    Julie M. Schoenung

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  1. Thale R. Smith
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Correspondence to Thale R. Smith.

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Smith, T.R., Sugar, J.D., San Marchi, C. et al. Microstructural development in DED stainless steels: applying welding models to elucidate the impact of processing and alloy composition. J Mater Sci 56, 762–780 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-020-05232-y

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