Response to Discussion of “Investigation of Oxide Bifilms in Investment Cast Superalloy IN100 Part I and II”

Abstract

In his most recent letter (Campbell in Met Trans A, 2017), Professor Campbell provides additional comments on Kaplan and Fuchs papers “Oxides Bifilms in Superalloy: IN100, Parts I and II (Met Trans A 47A:2346-2361, 2016; Met Trans A 47A:2362-2375, 2016) and on their response to his initial comments (Met Trans A 47A:3806-3809, 2016). In this recent submission, Campbell provides some very interesting thoughts on why bifilms were not observed by Kaplan and Fuchs and creates a new theory for the formation of defects referred to as bifilms. However, Campbell again provides no evidence to substantiate the presence of bifilms in Ni-base superalloys or his newly theorized mechanism. The vast majority of Campbell’s comments are based solely on the re-interpretation of the photomicrographs and the data reported in the literature, including those presented by Kaplan and Fuchs (Met Trans A 47A:2346-2361, 2016; Met Trans A 47A:2362-2375, 2016). Campbell claims that bifilms are present throughout Ni-base superalloys, even though no one else has reported the presence of bifilms in Ni-base superalloys. In re-interpreting the data and images, Campbell ignores the extensive surface characterization results reported by Kaplan and Fuchs (Met Trans A 47A:2346-2361, 2016; Met Trans A 47A:2362-2375, 2016) that clearly indicate that there are no oxide films or bifilms on the fracture surfaces examined. Please note that this discussion of Campbell’s most recent letter will be limited to Ni-base superalloys, since that is the subject of the research reported by Kaplan and Fuchs.