Magnetron Sputtering as a Microstructural Screening Tool for Laser Additive Manufacturing: Study on Ni Superalloys

Abstract

In this work, magnetron sputtering coupled with a heat treatment is demonstrated as a route to obtain surrogate microstructures comparable to those achieved by laser‐based additive manufacturing (AM) for Ni‐superalloys. Furthermore, this technique is shown to be a novel and efficient way of screening elemental additions with high compositional resolution for AM, without the need for designing and characterizing custom atomized powders. Here, Inconel 718 films are sputtered from both arc melted and AM targets to capture any compositional changes and to develop a comprehensive methodology. Films were characterized via electron microscopy techniques to establish similarities between sputtered plus heat‐treated films and bulk AM Inconel 718 microstructures reported in literature. Since Inconel 718 is susceptible to high temperature S embrittlement, films were then co‐sputtered with small amounts of Zr or Hf, which were found to facilitate sulfur segregation via NanoSIMS analysis. Overall, this work highlights how magnetron sputtering plus heat treatment can be leveraged to rapidly screen novel AM microstructures, thereby accelerating the development and deployment of AM materials.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.