The effect of local texture on crack propagation in FeAl ordered alloy

Abstract

The ordered Fe-Al alloys have received considerable attention during the last few years, due to their possible high temperature structural use. B2 iron aluminide is attractive also from a density consideration and might be a promising matrix material for fiber reinforce composite systems. However, poor ductility prevents potential applications of this material. Iron aluminides exhibit preferentially intergranular fracture at room temperature which indicates the importance of grain boundary (GB) properties for mechanical behavior of these polycrystals. It is well known that the type of GB strongly affects its cohesion energy, which leads to preferential crack propagation along high energy GBs, whereas, the low energy GBs are resistant to the fracture. The effect of GB parameters on fracture behavior was an impetus for the study of GB characteristics in the ordered alloys. In these works, an enhanced plasticity is associated with the higher portion of small angle and low-[Sigma] GBs in polycrystal. Obviously, these data evidence the possibility of GB design, which can be used in addition to the alloying to improve the plasticity of these materials. This paper aims to study the GB characteristics (misorientation parameters and spatial distribution of different type GBs) in Fe-Al alloy to elucidate the microstructuralmore » aspects of fracture behavior of B2 FeAl.« less