A New Correlation Between MC Precipitate Size, Aging Time and Temperature for an Advanced Austenitic Steel

Abstract

The MC precipitate size distributions have been measured for times of 1, 10, 100, 300 and 1000 hr at 700 and 900° C in a 16Ni-14Cr advanced austenitic steel. A new correlation between the mean precipitate size, aging time and temperature has been developed. The new correlation is compatible with a solute exhaustion mechanism, which may explain why (i) the MC precipitates formed on matrix dislocations resist coarsening for up to 3000 hr at 900°C; and (ii) the degree of cold work (i.e., the dislocation density), which determines the number of MC nucleation sites, controls the limiting precipitate size.