Electropulses induced direct aging and ultrafast precipitation in additive manufactured 15-5 PH stainless steel

Abstract

Periodic electric current pulses, i.e. electropulses, were applied on selective laser melting prepared 15-5 precipitation hardening stainless steel for direct aging. Traditional aging treatment typically takes hours to achieve peak hardening and could induce reverted austenite. Herein, electropulsing treatment on as-built sample can dramatically reduce the processing time to 6 min. Moreover, the nucleation of reverted austenite triggered by the segregation of Ni atoms on the interfaces between Cu-rich precipitates and martensite was not observed. These two unique phenomena were rationalized to the unsynchronized enhancement of diffusivity of Cu and Ni atoms under electropulses due to their different electron configurations.