Application of Electron Backscatter Diffraction to Grain Boundaries

2010 ◽  
Vol 160 ◽  
pp. 39-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerie Randle

The technique of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) is ideal for the characterisation of grain boundary networks in polycrystalline materials. In recent years the experimental methodology has evolved to meet the needs of the research community. For example, the capabilities of EBSD have been instrumental in driving forward the topic of ‘grain boundary engineering’. In this paper the current capabilities of EBSD for grain boundary characterisation will be reviewed and illustrated by examples. Topics are measurement strategies based on misorientation statistics, determination of grain boundary plane distributions and grain boundary network characteristics.

2010 ◽  
Vol 667-669 ◽  
pp. 373-378
Author(s):  
Liang Zhu ◽  
Hugo Ricardo Zschommler Sandim ◽  
Marc Seefeldt ◽  
Bert Verlinden

To understand and model grain refinement in severe plastic deformation, some analysis of Nb single crystals has been carried out in previous work. To bridge the gap with normal polycrystalline materials, supplementary experiments on large polycrystals, deformed at moderate strains appear to be necessary to explain the grain subdivision step by step. In the present work, successive uniaxial compression tests have been carried out on a large grained Niobium polycrystal up to height reductions of 30% with small strain increments. Electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) analysis was done after each compression step to characterize the evolution of orientation and microstructures. It is observed that a “rotation front” forms inside the grain and moves with increasing strain from one side to the other side of the grain. In one grain, this process results in a grain boundary affected zone in the vicinity of the grain boundary. Both static orientation evolution inside the grain and historical evolution of the average orientation have been studied, which indicates that the grain orientation rotates around one of the (110) poles at low strain.


2000 ◽  
Vol 6 (S2) ◽  
pp. 940-941
Author(s):  
A.J. Schwartz ◽  
M. Kumar ◽  
P.J. Bedrossian ◽  
W.E. King

Grain boundary network engineering is an emerging field that encompasses the concept that modifications to conventional thermomechanical processing can result in improved properties through the disruption of the random grain boundary network. Various researchers have reported a correlation between the grain boundary character distribution (defined as the fractions of “special” and “random” grain boundaries) and dramatic improvements in properties such as corrosion and stress corrosion cracking, creep, etc. While much early work in the field emphasized property improvements, the opportunity now exists to elucidate the underlying materials science of grain boundary network engineering. Recent investigations at LLNL have coupled automated electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) with transmission electron microscopy (TEM)5 and atomic force microscopy (AFM) to elucidate these fundamental mechanisms.An example of the coupling of TEM and EBSD is given in Figures 1-3. The EBSD image in Figure 1 reveals “segmentation” of boundaries from special to random and random to special and low angle grain boundaries in some grains, but not others, resulting from the 15% compression of an Inconel 600 polycrystal.


2005 ◽  
Vol 495-497 ◽  
pp. 1225-1230
Author(s):  
Andre Luiz Pinto ◽  
Carlos Sergio da Costa Viana ◽  
Luiz Henrique de Almeida

Grain boundary engineering has been applied to different materials in order to increase properties particularly sensitive to intergranular phenomena. This work analyses the micromechanisms that allow the control of the amount of special boundaries which respect coincidence site lattice theory. α-brass, a lead alloy, Inconel 625 and Inconel 600 were submitted to different thermomechanical treatments and were analyzed via electron backscatter diffraction in order to characterize their grain boundaries. The occurrence of thin twins in some crystal directions during the deformation step seems to determine the results obtained as well as strain induced boundary migration.


2013 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 483-492 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariusz Jedrychowski ◽  
Jacek Tarasiuk ◽  
Brigitte Bacroix ◽  
Sebastian Wronski

The main aim of the present work is to study the relation between microstructural features – such as local misorientations, grain orientation gradients and grain boundary structures – and thermomechanical treatment of hexagonal zirconium (Zr702α). Electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) topological maps are used to analyze the aforementioned material parameters at the early stages of plastic deformation imposed by channel-die compression, as well as at a partial recrystallization state achieved by brief annealing. The evolution of local misorientations and orientation gradients is investigated using the so-called kernel average misorientation (KAM) and grain orientation spread (GOS) statistics implemented in the TSLOIMdata analysis software [TexSEM Laboratories (2004), Draper, UT, USA]. In the case of grain boundaries (GBs) a new method of analysis is presented. As an addition to the classical line segments method, where the grain boundary is represented by line segments that separate particular pairs of neighboring points, an approach that focuses on grain boundary areas is proposed. These areas are represented by sets of EBSD points, which are specially selected from a modified calculation procedure for the KAM. Different evolution mechanisms of intragranular boundaries, low-angle grain boundaries and high-angle grain boundaries are observed depending on the compression direction. The observed differences are consistent with the results obtained from KAM and GOS analysis. It is also concluded that the proposed method of grain boundary characterization seems to be promising, as it provides new and interesting analysis tools such as textures, absolute fractions and other EBSD statistics of the GB areas. This description may be more compatible with a real deformed microstructure, especially for grain boundaries with very small misorientation, which are indeed clustered areas of lattice defect accumulation.


2011 ◽  
Vol 172-174 ◽  
pp. 378-383
Author(s):  
Guo Hong Zhang ◽  
Tomoaki Takeuchi ◽  
Masato Enomoto ◽  
Yoshitaka Adachi

The nucleation of bcc ferrite precipitates at austenite grain corners in a Co-15Fe alloy was studied by serial sectioning coupled with electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) analysis. Grain corners were identified by recombination of triple points and triangular annihilation, whereas quite a few precipitates were surrounded by more than four matrix grains when twins were counted as individual grains. More than 40% of corners composed all of high angle grain boundaries were vacant at an undercooling of ~60°C from the g/(a+g) phase boundary. All the precipitates had K-S or N-W orientation relationship with at least one grain and a larger proportion of them had the OR with two and three grains. For half of vacant corners a hypothetical precipitate could have the OR with more than one grain. It is likely that not only the misorientations among the matrix grains, but also the orientations of the grain boundary planes have a major influence on nucleation potency even at grain corners.


2007 ◽  
Vol 539-543 ◽  
pp. 3389-3394 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Guo Wang

The progress of grain boundary engineering (GBE) is overviewed and the challenges for further investigations emphasized. It points out that, the electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) reconstruction of grain boundaries, which gives the information of connectivity interruption of general high angle boundaries (HABs), is more significant than purely pursuing high frequency of so-called special boundaries. The criterion for the optimization of grain boundary character distribution (GBCD) needs to be established. The energy spectrum and the degradation susceptibility of grain boundaries of various characters including HABs and low Σ(Σ≤29) coincidence site lattice (CSL) needs to be studied and ascertained. And finally, the newly proposed model of non-coherent Σ3 interactions for GBCD optimization are discussed.


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