Softening Mechanisms

Annealing the deformed material after thermomechanical processing results in substructure evolution leading to reduction in
stored energy. The substructure evolution occurs by thermally assisted processes resulting in softening of the annealed
material.

In commercial alloys
0.4-0.5 Tm – Recovery dominates and often leads to slow, logarithmic decrease of hardness
Greater than 0.7 Tm = Recrystallization can occur very rapidly without much of prior recovery
Intermediate temperatures- Both the mechanisms significantly contribute to softening.
 Recovery Mechanisms

1. Annihilation of point defects (vacancies and interstitials) by diffusion to sinks such as dislocations.
2. Annhilation of dislocations of opposite sign which requires the occurrence of climb and/or cross slip.
3. Organization of free, random dislocations into dislocation walls or sub-boundaries . This process is called polygonization.
4. Coalescence of sub-boundary walls during subgrain growth.

Exothermic peaks (Heat Release) during

heating of cold rolled ultrahigh pure Fe.
Schematic of successive dislocation annihilation mechanisms; cross-
section of a bent crystal containing both free (edge) dislocations and
dislocations, which accommodate the orientation gradient. During
annealing, some dislocations anhilate out by climb of opposite sign
segments (encircled pairs) then the remainder rearrange into subgrain
boundaries.
 Annealing-Recovery-Annihilation of Dislocations

Schematic illustration of dislocation

annihilation

Schematic in (a) shows that positive edge dislocations

(same sign) which lie on same slip plane repel each
other while that in (b) shows that dislocations of
opposite signs which lie on same slip plane get
attracted to each other resulting in annhilation of
dislocations.
 Recovery-Polygonization

Driving force for slip and climb is the stored strain energy of dislocations. The strain energy decreases during
polygonization.
Solute atoms, fine distributions of second phase particles reduce the defect mobility and therefore the recovery kinetics.

Stacking Fault Energy (SFE) has a strong influence on the amount of recovery in single phase materials. In deformed Al and α
Fe which are high SFE materials, significant amount of recovery occurs due to ease of cross slip and anhilation of dislocations.
However, in low SFE materials like rolled austenitic steels and α Brass, significant amount of recovery does not occur before
recrystallization.

Structural changes during recovery

• Rearrangement of dislocations into cellular structures (for high-SFE materials and most hot-deformed metals, this occurs
simultaneously with deformation).

• Elimination of free dislocations within the cells.

• Collapse of the complicated dislocation cell walls into neat subgrain boundaries – mostly by annihilation of excess or
redundant dislocations and rearrangement of the others into low-energy configurations.

• Subgrain growth. During continued annealing, an increase in subgrain size is theoretically expected since it leads to a
reduction of internal energy. The experimentally observed kinetic relationships are usually written as

dn − d0n = k3t

where d and d0 are the final and initial subgrain size, n, and k3 are constants. k3 is strongly temperature-dependent
(through the activation energy), values of n lie between 2 and 7.
 Recrystallization
Recrystallization

Recrystallization is the replacement of cold-worked structure by a new set of strain free grains. In this process there is
nucleation of strain free region whose boundary can transform the strained matrix into strain-free material as it moves.

Recrystallization is evidenced by decrease in hardness or strength and increase in ductility. Stored energy of the cold work is
the driving force for recrystallization and recovery.

During the growth of the boundary out from the nucleus, the dislocations are annihilated in the region swept through. This
requires that the moving boundary be a high angle boundary so that there is a high degree of “misfit” to accommodate the
dislocations.

Atleast two distinct nucleation mechanisms have been identified for recrystallization.
(1)Strain induced boundary migration
A strain free nucleus is formed when one of the existing grain boundaries moves into its neighbour, leaving a strain free
recrystallized region behind. The boundary moves into the grain which contains the higher dislocation density.

The boundary should effectively sweep up the dislocations in its path, thereby creating a small strain free volume in the
crystal.
 Annealing-Recrystallization

(2) New grain boundaries form at highly energetic sites (sharp lattice curvature), such as grain boundary triple points, original
grain boundaries and boundaries between deformation bands, twin boundaries, inclusions or second phase particles.

The nuclei may form by subgrain growth and/or grain boundary migration.

(A) Growth of the subgrains to the right of the original grain boundary.

(B)Nucleus has formed by grain boundary migration to the right and subgrain
growth to the left.

For both cases, the nucleus is surrounded by high-angle boundaries.

(C) the subgrain growth to the left has taken place without forming a
new high-angle boundary.

The density of dislocations decreases considerably and effects of strain hardening are eliminated.
Recrystallization

Fig. Grain boundary migration in nickel pulled 10% and

annealed 10 min at 425°C. The region behind the advancing
boundary is dislocation-free. (After J. Bailey and P. Hirsch,
Proceedings of the Royal Society, London, A267 (1962)
11.)

Sources of recrystallized grains are

1. Deformed grains
2. Shear bands
3. Particle stimulated nucleation (PNS)
Dislocations can be trapped by relatively large non-shearable particles (Ashby et al. [1970])
The dislocation density around a particle is represented as
3Fvs
ρ = 𝑟𝑏
where Fv, r, s and b are volume fraction and size of the of the 2nd phase particles, shear strain and
dislocation Burgers vector. The entrapment and corresponding increase in dislocation density leads to the formation of a
deformation zone –region around the 2nd phase particles with large misorientation developments. Recrystallization is
favoured from particle-deformed zones due to large differences in the stored energies.
Low angle and High Angle Boundaries

[Link]

If θ < 15⁰, the grain boundary is called low angle grain boundary (LAGB) and
if θ > 15⁰, the GB is called High angle grain boundary (HAGB)
 HAGB and LAGB

H. GLEITER, in Physical Metallurgy (Fourth Edition), 1996

[Link]
Physical Metallurgy Principles, Fourth Edition ngineering/high-angle-grain-boundary
Reza Abbaschian, Lara Abbaschian, Robert E. Reed-Hill
 Annealing-Grain Growth
Grain Growth

After recrystallization is complete, the strain-free grains will continue to grow if the
metal specimen is left at the elevated temperature, this phenomenon is called grain
growth.

Grain growth does not need to be preceded by recovery and recrystallization; it may
occur in all polycrystalline materials, metals and ceramics alike.

Driving force for the grain growth is the reduction in total grain boundary energy. The
atoms at grain boundaries are bonded less regularly compared to those at the interior of
grains.

During grain growth large grains grow at the expense of small grains that shrink.

Grain growth occurs by migration of grain boundaries. Movement of grain boundaries

takes place due to short range diffusion of atoms.
Grain Growth

There is an additional driving force for grain boundary

migration due to the difference in free energy of the material
across a curved boundary.

1 1
ΔG = γ 𝑉ത (𝑟 + 𝑟 )
1 2

ΔG is the free energy difference across the curved interface, γ

is the boundary energy, 𝑉ത is the molar volume, r1 and r2 are the
principal radii of curvature.

This free energy difference is due to pressure difference (ΔP )

across the curved interface.

γ
ΔP = 2 𝑟

Grains with less than 6 sides have walls that are concave
towards the centres and these grains tend to shrink. Grains
having more than 6 sides have walls that are convex toward the
centres tend to grow in size.
 Grain Growth
Grain Growth Law

𝑑 𝑛 - 𝑑0𝑛 = kt

Where d is the grain diameter at time t and 𝑑0 is the grain diameter at t=0. K and n are time-independent constants and
value of n is equal to or greater than 2.

Numerical

When a hypothetical metal having a grain diameter of 8.2 x10-3 mm is heated to 500 ⁰C for 12.5 min, the grain diameter
increases to 2.7 x 10-2 mm. Compute the grain diameter when a specimen of the original material is heated at 500 ⁰C for 100
min. Assume the grain diameter exponent n has a value of 2.
Dynamic Recrystallization

The structure can recrystallize during deformation under certain conditions. The phenomenon is called Dynamic
Recrystallization.

Fig. Typical flow curves during cold and hot deformation

 Fig. Evolution of the microstructure during (a) hot deformation of a material showing recovery and (b) dynamic
recrystallization or discontinuous dynamic recrystallization

Dynamic recovery is typical of high-SFE metals (e.g. aluminium, low-carbon ferritic steel, etc.), where the flow stress saturates
after an initial period of work hardening. This saturation value depends on temperature, strain rate and composition.

Broad peak (or multiple peaks) typically accompany dynamic recrystallization.

Equilibrium is reached between the hardening due to dislocation accumulation and the softening due to dynamic recrystallization.
At this stage, the flow curve reaches a plateau and the microstructure consists of a dynamic mixture of grains with various
dislocation densities.