The superduplex stainless steels (SDSS) are widely used in chemical, oil and gas industries, to pipelines and storage material facilities. In welding process or working in temperature elevated, secondary phases may appear in the form of precipitates, as the sigma phase (σ) which is an intermetallic compound. This compound is harmful to the properties of steel, deteriorating its mechanical properties, such as decreasing corrosion resistance and toughness. In this paper it is analyzed the formation, kinetics and microstructural evolution of sigma phase in SDSS UNS S32750 after isothermal aging at 700ºC, 750ºC and 800ºC. In this work sigma phase kinetics is studied by JMAK theory and by two microstructural path descriptors, S V , interfacial area per unit of volume between sigma phase and austenite, and <λ>, mean chord length of sigma, both in function of the V V , volumetric fraction of sigma, known in the literature as microstructural partial path (MP). The MP formulation is common in recrystallization studies, but so far has not been used in the sigma phase precipitation studies, being applied here for the first time. The results indicated that the sigma phase nucleates by site saturation with anisotropic linear impingement. This means that sigma phase nucleates on edges.

Duplex Stainless Steels (DSS) and Superduplex Stainless Steels (SDSS) have a strong appeal in the petrochemical industry. These steels have excellent properties, such as corrosion resistance and good toughness besides good weldability. Welding techniques take into account the loss of alloying elements during the process, so this loss is usually compensated by the addition of a filler metal rich in alloying elements. A possible problem would be during the welding of these materials in adverse conditions in service, where the operator could have difficulties in welding with the filler metal. Therefore, in this work, two DSS and one SDSS were welded, by autogenous Tungsten Inert Gas (TIG), i.e., without addition of a filler metal, by three different heat inputs. After welding, microstructural, mechanical, and electrochemical analysis was performed. The microstructures were characterized for each welding condition, with the aid of optical microscopy (OM). Vickers hardness, Charpy-V, and cyclic polarization tests were also performed. After the electrochemical tests, the samples were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The SDSS welded with high heat input kept the balance of the austenite and ferrite, and toughness above the limit value. The hardness values remain constant in the weld regions and SDSS is the most resistant to corrosion.

Grain boundary pinning by particles is widely used to prevent grain growth during heat treatment in a variety of commercial alloys. Its practical relevance is matched by a considerable amount of theoretical work that has been devoted this problem. A key issue of boundary pinning is the particle/interface interaction mechanism and its associated pinning force. According to Ashby et al. an interface may interact with a particle in two ways: either it goes through the particles or, more usually, bends round and envelopes the particle. Based on these mechanisms one may derive quantitative expressions relating the characteristics of the particle dispersion and a critical or limiting grain radius. Thus, Zener expression assumes that the interface goes through the particles whereas Rios expression assumes that the interface bends round and envelopes the particle. Both the mechanisms and the resulting expressions are discussed here in detail and compared with available experimental data.

The properties of the super duplex stainless steels (SDSS) are strongly affected by the thermal history imposed by welding procedures. The controlled dual phase microstructure (ferrite and austenite) guarantee excellent mechanical properties such as mechanical strength and corrosion resistance, in addition to small thermal expansion coefficient and high thermal conductivity. In this paper, we newly proposed a model able to predict the thermal history of the welding pieces coupled with local mechanical properties developed during welding procedure that combine the effects of temperature and phase changes during welding. We applied inverse method to fit the thermophysical parameters based on measured data. The model was verified by comparing measured and predicted temperature profiles using thermocouples located within the heat affected zone. Thus, an inverse method was implemented to obtain the parameters fitting for the grain growth evolution compatible with the final microstructure and grain size measured using SEM images and stereological techniques. We demonstrated that very small amount of non-equilibrium deleterious phases and nanosized precipitated are expected during the welding procedures depending upon the local conditions of temperature, compositions and alloying dilution evolutions.

No abstract