Alloy Case Studies

SEA-CURE®
Super Ferritic Stainless Steel Tubing
The ferritic structure of SEA-CURE® stainless
steel provides a high strength/low work
hardening material with good ductility. These
properties allow high design stress limits with
good fabrication characteristics. Because of
the nickel addition, SEA-CURE® has a lower
ductile to brittle transition temperature than
similar ferritic steels without nickel additions.
What’s special about Ni?
• The elements C, Ni and Mn are the most
important ones in this group. Sufficiently
large amounts of Ni or Mn render a steel
austenitic even at room temperature. An
example of this is the so-called Hadfield
steel which contains 13% Mn, 1,2% Cr and
l% C. In this steel both the Mn and C take
part in stabilizing the austenite. Another
example is austenitic stainless steel
containing 18% Cr and 8% Ni.
• The equilibrium diagram for iron-nickel,
Figure 1, shows how the range of stability
of austenite increases with increasing Ni.
• An alloy containing 10% Ni becomes
wholly austenitic if heated to 700°C. On
cooling, transformation from g to a takes
place in the temperature range 700-
300°C.
 Superalloys
• high-performance alloy that exhibits excellent mechanical strength and creep
resistance at high temperatures, good surface stability, and corrosion and
oxidation resistance.
• matrix with an austenitic FCC crystal structure. Base alloying element is
usually Ni, Co, or Ni-Fe.
• Typical applications aerospace, industrial gas turbine, and marine turbine
industry (turbine blades).
• Examples: Waspalloy: Nickel 58%, chromium 19%, cobalt 13%, molybdenum
4%, titanium 3%, aluminium 1.4%
• Hastelloy, Inconel
 Applications

Turbide blade (jet)

A NASA-GEAE-P&W team developed the
advanced single crystal superalloy, EPM-102,
which has been cast into a fully machined CF6-
80E high pressure turbine (HPT) blade (left)
 Why so special? How?
• Superalloys develop high temperature strength through solid solution
strengthening.
• Oxidation and corrosion resistance is provided by the formation of a
protective oxide layer which is formed when the metal is exposed to
oxygen and encapsulates the material, and thus protecting the rest of the
component. Oxidation or corrosion resistance is provided by elements
such as aluminium and chromium.
• By far the most important strengthening mechanism is through the
formation of secondary phase precipitates such as gamma prime and
carbides through precipitation strengthening. Creep resistance is
dependent on slowing the speed of dislocations within the crystal
structure.
Corrosion Resistance of Alloys
 Damascus Sabre
Carbides precipitate out as micro particles arranged in sheets or bands within the body of a blade. The
carbides are far harder than the surrounding low carbon steel, allowing the swordsmith to make an
edge which would cut hard materials with the precipitated carbides, while the bands of softer steel
allowed the sword as a whole to remain tough and flexible.

The banded carbide precipitates appear in the blade as a swirling pattern. By manipulating the ingot of
steel in a certain way during forging, various intentional patterns could be induced in the steel. The
most common of these was a pattern of lateral bands, often called 'Muhammad's Ladder', most likely
formed by cutting or forging notches into the surface of the ingot, then forging it into the blade shape.
• A team of researchers based at the Technical University of
Dresden that uses x-rays and electron microscopy to examine
Damascus steel discovered the presence of cementite
nanowires[7] and carbon nanotubes.[8] Peter Paufler, a
member of the Dresden team, says that these nanostructures
give Damascus steel its distinctive properties[9] and are a
result of the forging process.[5][9]
 Shape Memory Alloys
• The generic name for the family of nickel-titanium alloys is
Nitinol. In 1961, Nitinol, which stands for Nickel Titanium
Naval Ordnance Laboratory, was discovered to possess the
unique property of having shape memory. William J. Buehler,
a researcher at the Naval Ordnance Laboratory in White Oak,
Maryland, was the one to discover this shape memory alloy.
The actual discovery of the shape memory property of Nitinol
came about by accident. At a laboratory management
meeting, a strip of Nitinol was presented that was bent out of
shape many times. One of the people present, Dr. David S.
Muzzey, heated it with his pipe lighter, and surprisingly, the
strip stretched back to its original form.
How

Dr. Martin Bram

m.bram@fz-juelich.de
How