Length-Scale-Dependent Micromechanical Modeling for Precipitate Hardening in Inconel 718 Superalloy

Abstract

In this paper, a micromechanical finite element (FE) model has been proposed to investigate the effect of the nanoscale precipitates on the development of microplasticity for Inconel 718 (IN718) superalloy. A strain gradient crystal plasticity formulation has been developed with the considerations of the evolution of statistically stored dislocation density and geometrically necessary dislocation density. The mesh convergence has been examined, showing that sufficiently fine mesh is required in the FE model. The results show that the model with strain gradient effect incorporated shows less peak plastic strain and higher value of dislocation density than the model with no strain gradient effect. The present study indicates that the strain hardening process at the scale of strengthening precipitate is mainly governed by the evolution of geometrically necessary dislocation densities.