Microstructure dislocations

Champion and Rohde [42] investigate the effects of shock-wave amplitude and duration on the Rockwell C hardness [41] and microstructure of Hadfield steel over the pressure range of 0.4-48 GPa (pulse duration of 0.065 s, 0.230 ls, and 2.2 ps). The results are shown in Fig. 7.8. In addition to the very pronounced effeet of pulse duration on hardness shown in Fig. 7.8, postshoek electron microscope observations indicate that it is the final dislocation density and not the specific microstructure that is important in determining the hardness. 

Slides Microstructures showing precipitates electron micrographs of dislocation tangles micrographs of polycrystalline metals. 

The sequence just outlined provides a salutary lesson in the nature of explanation in materials science. At first the process was a pure mystery. Then the relationship to the shape of the solid-solubility curve was uncovered that was a partial explanation. Next it was found that the microstructural process that leads to age-hardening involves a succession of intermediate phases, none of them in equilibrium (a very common situation in materials science as we now know). An understanding of how these intermediate phases interact with dislocations was a further stage in explanation. Then came an nnderstanding of the shape of the GP zones (planar in some alloys, globniar in others). Next, the kinetics of the hardening needed to be... 

Tinplate and Solder. Metallurgical studies were performed to determine the effect of irradiation at low temperature on the corrosion resistance of tinplate and on the mechanical properties and microstructure of tinplate and side-seam solder of the tinplate container. The area of major interest was the effect of low-temperature irradiation on the possible conversion of the tin from the beta form to the alpha form. In the case of pure tin, the transition occurs at 18 °C. It was feared that low-temperature irradiation would create dislocations in the crystal lattice of tin and enhance the conversion of tin from the silvery form to a powdery form rendering the tin coating ineffective in protecting the base steel. Tin used for industrial consumption contains trace amounts of soluble impurities of lead and antimony to retard this conversion for several years. 

The importance of dislocations becomes evident when we consider the strain on the microstructure of a simple crystal. The atoms or ions in a crystal are in symmetric energy wells and so vibrate around their lattice site. When we track across a crystal plane, the potential energy increases and decreases in a regular fashion with the minima at the lattice points... 

Tritium and its decay product, helium, change the structural properties of stainless steels and make them more susceptible to cracking. Tritium embrittlement is an enhanced form of hydrogen embrittlement because of the presence of He from tritium decay which nucleates as nanometer-sized bubbles on dislocations, grain boundaries, and other microstructural defects. Steels with decay helium bubble microstructures are hardened and less able to deform plastically and become more susceptible to embrittlement by hydrogen and its isotopes (1-7). 

In crystalline solids, only coherent spinodal decomposition is observed. The process of forming incoherent interfaces involves the generation of anticoherency dislocation structures and is incompatible with the continuous evolution of the phase-separated microstructure characteristic of spinodal decomposition. Systems with elastic misfit may first transform by coherent spinodal decomposition and then, during the later stages of the process, lose coherency through the nucleation and capture of anticoherency interfacial dislocations [18]. 

In summary, it is clear that there are substantial effects that vary systematically with the wavelength of the multilayer due both to internal stresses and the microstructure of the coatings. It has also been seen that deformation can occur not just by dislocation flow, as the initial analyses have assumed, but by mechanisms such as lattice rotations and shear along column boundaries. In addition, the use of indentation complicates the deformation field, so that the assumption that equal strains in both layers are required need not be correct. These effects all influence the hardness but have not so far been included in analyses. 

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