Cottam - (2014) - Characterization of Microstructure and Residual Stress in A 3D H13 Tool Steel Component Produced by Additive Manufacturing
Cottam - (2014) - Characterization of Microstructure and Residual Stress in A 3D H13 Tool Steel Component Produced by Additive Manufacturing
Cottam - (2014) - Characterization of Microstructure and Residual Stress in A 3D H13 Tool Steel Component Produced by Additive Manufacturing
net/publication/271903315
CITATIONS READS
33 1,555
3 authors, including:
Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:
All content following this page was uploaded by Vladimir Luzin on 13 February 2015.
H13 tool steel was deposited using the additive manufacturing technique Direct Metal Deposition
to produce a part having a wedge geometry. The wedge was characterized both in terms of
microstructure and residual stress. It was found that phase transformations were significantly
influencing the microstructure, which was then linked to the residual stress distribution as seen in
Fig. 8. The residual stress distribution was found to be opposite to that reported in the literature.
This was attributed to the low temperature martensitic phase transformation of the H13 tool steel
and the subsequent tempering of the microstructure with an increasing number of layers of
deposited material. The high hardness and compressive residual stress of the top 4 mm of the wedge
are ideal in die casting and forging dies, as it will resist thermal fatigue. It also has a hardness higher
than that produced by typical heat treatment processes.
1978 J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014 Ó Materials Research Society 2014
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
FIG. 1. Schematics of AM processes showing the key components; (a) DMD where (1) the laser beam, (2) nozzle shielding gas, (3) powder feeding
nozzle, (4) deposited track, (5) substrate; (b) selective laser melting (SLM) where (1) laser, (2) double rotating mirror system, (3) beam focus lens,
(4) powder feeding system, (5) building platform, (6) recoater, (7) powder recovery/recycle.
the cooling rate produced by the DMD process for H13 is that the effect of transformation plasticity and tempering of
around 3 K/s, which is quite fast and as such produces the microstructure were not taken into account in the
a cellular microstructure. For the range of laser parameters model. It is clear that H13 tool steel residual stresses are
tested, the dimension of the cellular structures only varies important for their use in making forming dies from
by several micrometers. Maziasz et al.9 evaluated the a fatigue point of view, this appears to be connected to
residual stress of spray formed and DMD deposited H13 the microstructure produced. These effects on a simple
and found that a tensile stress is produced during DMD in 3D build/component have not been evaluated and this is
the deposited region, which was balanced with a compres- the next step in developing the technology for this
sive stress in the substrate. It was also noted that the DMD material/application.
process produced an over tempering of the previous tracks,
which is undesirable. Pinkerton and Li10 evaluated the
effect of the powder morphology on the deposition of H13 II. EXPERIMENTAL
and found that the main difference was a rougher surface A POM DMD 505 equipped with a 5 kW CO2 laser
finish for the water atomized powder due to its irregular was used to manufacture the H13 tool steel wedge shape,
shape. Spray forming of H13 has also been studied11 and it Fig. 2. The STEP file of the wedge was open in the DMD
was found that process parameters influenced the micro- CAM software where a raster strategy was produced. The
structure produced, but more importantly, the compressive 90° cross-hatched path was used, Fig. 3, where the raster
residual stress state of the formed material increased tool moves through 90° between each layer, as this has been
life due to its ability to resist fatigue cracking. found to produce good material properties by the equip-
An understanding of residual stress formation in DMD ment manufacturer. The DMD processing parameters use
AM is still lacking. To date much of the work has a laser power of 2500 W, a traversing speed of 300 mm/min,
focused on simple structures such as walls12–14 and and a powder feed rate of 4.5 g/min. These parameters were
square pillars.13,15 The residual stress is compressive in developed in a previous trial and produced track
the center of all these structures and tensile is near the dimensions of 2 mm in width and 1 mm in height.
edges for both Waspaloy and stainless steel. A comparison Two layers were deposited sequentially followed by
between the wall and the pillar13 reveals that the magni- a 5 min interval, which was repeated six times giving
tude of the stress does not change significantly and the a build height of 12 mm.
distribution of stress is dictated by the geometry, which Residual strain through-sample-thickness scanning
can be linked to the cooling rates. For H13 there has been was carried out by neutron diffractometry at ANSTO in
a comprehensive study of residual stress, including full Kowari, NSW, Australia. The residual stress of the
thermal and mechanical modeling of the process,16 that wedge was measured down its center thus allowing for
were compared with experimental results. However, an the influence of section thickness to be resolved as
agreement between the experimental results and modeling a function of position. Three cross-sections were mea-
was missing. The difference can be attributed to the fact sured to ascertain the distribution of stress across the
J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014 1979
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
1980 J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
FIG. 4. Temperature measurements in three thermocouples placed 2 mm below the surface of the substrate, where the central thermocouple was
positioned in the middle of the wedge and the other two were 15 mm either side; (a) layers 1&2; (b) layers 3&4; (c) layers 5&6; (d) layers 7&8;
(e) layers 9&10; (f) layers 11&12.
The thermocouple near the tip immediately spikes due to it temperature begins to rise more gradually than the pre-
being close to the tip and then falls as the laser moves vious thermocouple measurements when the laser is on top
down the wedge away from the thermocouple. Because of the thermocouple, and cools as the laser moves away.
the wedge is thinner at the tip, the rate at which it moves The rate of cooling is slightly slower than the central
down the wedge decreases with processing time. There- thermocouple because the length of the tracks increases
fore, as the laser approaches the middle thermocouple, the with the wedge thickness, and hence more heat is put into
J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014 1981
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
1982 J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
FIG. 6. SEM of the H13 tool steel wedge taken from the central cross-section. The positions of the images correspond to the position of the white dots
in Fig. 5.
has been reached due to the smaller cross-section of the the compression zone in the top and bottom regions of the
material. Beyond this the hardness is relatively unchanged, wedge does not match in depth. The compressive stress is
which is consistent with the microstructure not changing around 250 MPa in magnitude in both the top and bottom
and suggests that temperatures reached in the initial layers regions and there is a thin band of tensile stress just above
are not enough to change the microstructure further due to the central region of the sample that is around 150 MPa in
the heat from the upper layers. This result emphasizes magnitude. However, the stress distribution is compres-
the fact that the section thickness does play a role in the sive near the top and bottom surface and tensile near the
mechanical properties produced, particularly when the center, which is the opposite to that reported by other
microstructure can transform due to heat. investigations.12,14,15 They found the opposite trend where
The residual stress distributions for the H13 wedge are the center was in compression and the surface was in
shown in Fig. 8. The distribution of stress is not tension like an inverse quench.
symmetrical like a quenching stress,19 in that the side The compressive stress at the very top of the wedge
walls of the wedge are not in compression and the size of can be attributed to the low martensitic transformation
J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014 1983
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
FIG. 7. Micro-Vickers microhardness map of H13 tool steel wedge, measured in the central cross-section, where the start of the hardness map is the
thick end of the wedge.
FIG. 8. Residual stress map of H13 tool steel wedge showing results of four different orientations where measurements were made. The units of the
scale are MPa.
temperature of this steel.16 It is well known in the welding the material, the size of the dilation component of the
literature that steels with a low martensitic transformation transformation, and the elastic modulus of the material.21
temperature produce compressive residual stresses in their This phenomenon is the cause of the compressive residual
martensitic regions. The formation of the compressive stress stress in the top layer of the wedge. Then further down it was
is due to the contraction (dilation) of the material during the observed that retained austenite was transforming to mar-
transformation.20 When this occurs at a low temperature tensite again, and this transformation exerts a compressive
tensile stresses that have formed during cooling are either stress on the structure resulting in the region of compressive
reduced or they become compressive. The final stress stress existing up to 2 mm into the structure. This corre-
magnitude and sign depends on the thermal expansion of sponds to the dull region of the macrostructure in Fig. 5.
1984 J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
The residual stress then transitions into a tensile re- manufacturing. Therefore, it is possible to use the tool
sidual stress just above the center of the wedge. This steel in the as-deposited condition, hence removing the
region corresponds with the change in hardness and also heat treatment step and saving time and money in
the tempering of the microstructure. Essentially the production. The compressive stress in this top layer is
tempering of martensite to form ferrite and iron carbide also desirable as this will resist fatigue of the die during
causes tension in the microstructure due to the lattice service, adding another advantage over the traditional
spacing decreasing with the precipitation of the iron machining method. However, tempering of the struc-
carbide.22 No further microstructure changes occur and ture below a 4 mm depth is undesirable. Perhaps this
as such, the stress transitions back to compressive to could be avoided by making the bulk of the die with
balance the tensile stress in the center of the wedge. Due to a cheap material like mild steel and then using H13 for
the layered nature of the wedge construction, the stress in the final 4 mm of the die. While this idea needs to be
plane is largely unaffected by the metallurgical trans- proven, it would considerably benefit AM production
formations and therefore the changes in residual stress of tool steel dies over conventional machining and heat
occur in the N direction and not the L and T directions, treatment.
Fig. 8.
The residual stress distribution of the wedge is the IV. CONCLUSIONS
opposite of that found in other studies where the center
was in compression and the exterior was in tension. The Characterization of the H13 tool steel wedge has
work of Moat et al.12 used Waspalloy, which does not revealed the complex relationship between the effect of
undergo a martensitic phase transformation during cooling heat from the laser, the metallurgical characteristics of
and has very low thermal expansion and conductivity. the H13, and their effects on the microstructure and
Rangaswamy et al.13,14 evaluated Inconel, another nickel residual stress formed. The compressive stress state at
based alloy, and austenitic stainless steel, both of which do the top of the wedge can be attributed to the low
not undergo a martensitic phase transformation during martensitic transformation temperature of the H13 ma-
cooling. Therefore, the residual stress produced is due terial. The significant depth of the compressive stress
only to the cooling of the component once built. As region was attributed to retained austenite transforming
confirmed by the finite element modeling of Wang23 this is to martensite due to the heat from the laser. The region
the cause of the residual stress distribution observed in of tensile stress was attributed to the martensite being
these studies. However, as shown above there are three tempered by the heat from the laser causing the carbon
metallurgical factors that influence the residual stress trapped in solution to precipitate out as iron carbide.
distributions formed in the H13 wedge, which have While the residual stress was not influenced by the
a greater influence on the residual stress formed than just geometry, the tempering of the H13 was. It was
the cooling rate alone being the cause of the residual stress suggested that lower laser power levels should be used
distribution of the previous studies. to produce thin sections of H13. The as-deposited
The wedge shape of the construction has had almost no hardness and the compressive stress state in the top
effect on the residual stress distribution formed, which 4 mm of the wedge are ideal for use in die casting and
is illustrated by the fact that the magnitude and sign of forging dies and this illustrates the potential of the
the residual stress changes in the N orientation and not the AM process as a method to produce tooling.
T and L. Again this supports the explanation that the
stresses have arisen due to metallurgical effects, which ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
are consistent through the different layers of the material.
The authors would also like to thank Mr. Girish
However, the hardness map in Fig. 7 shows that tempering
Thipperudrappa for his help with conducting the DMD
effects are more pronounced at the tip of the wedge than
experiments, Mr. Andrew Moore for his help with the
the thick end of the wedge. This can be attributed to the
thermal measurements, and AINSE for supplying funding
temperatures reached in the tip of the wedge being higher
for neutron proposal 2747.
for longer compared to the thick end. This is reasonable as
the volume of material is small and as such requires less
energy to be heated. Also the heat has a smaller area to REFERENCES
diffuse into, which also acts to increase the temperature in 1. D.D. Gu, W. Meiners, K. Wissenbach, and R. Poprawe: Laser
the thinner sections. This suggests that perhaps lower laser additive manufacturing of metallic components: Materials, pro-
powers should be used to produce thin sections of H13 by cesses and mechanisms. Int. Mater. Rev. 57, 133 (2012).
DMD. 2. F.G. Arcella and F.H. Froes: Producing titanium aerospace compo-
nents from powder using laser forming. JOM 52, 28 (2000).
The high hardness in the top 4 mm of the wedge is 3. C.A. Brice and W.H. Hofmeister: Determination of bulk residual
higher than the strength typically developed during stresses in electron beam additive-manufactured aluminum. Metall.
heat treatment and post-machining in conventional Mater. Trans. A 44, 5147 (2013).
J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014 1985
R. Cottam et al.: Characterization of microstructure and residual stress in a 3D H13 tool steel component produced by additive manufacturing
4. B. Vayre, F. Vigna, and F. Villeneuve: Metallic additive 13. P. Rangaswamy, M.L. Griffith, M.B. Prime, T.M. Holden,
manufacturing: State-of-the-art review and prospects. Mech. Ind. R.B. Rogge, J.M. Edwards, and R.J. Sebring: Residual stresses in
13, 89 (2012). LENSÒ components using neutron diffraction and contour method.
5. L.E. Murr, S.A. Quinones, S.M. Gaytan, M.I. Lopez, A. Rodela, Mater. Sci. Eng., A 399, 72 (2005).
E.Y. Martinez, D.H. Hernandez, F. Martinez, F.R. Medina, and 14. P. Rangaswamy, T.M. Holden, R.B. Rogge, and M.L. Griffith:
R.B. Wicker: Microstructure and mechanical behavior of Ti-6Al- Residual stresses in components formed by the laser-engineered net
4V produced by rapid layer manufacturing for biomedical applica- shaping (LENSÒ) process. J. Strain Anal. Eng. Des. 38, 519 (2003).
tions. J. Mech. Behav. Biomed. Mater. 2, 20 (2009). 15. J-Y. Chen, K. Conlon, L. Xue, and R. Rogge: Experimental study of
6. S. Tsopanos, R.A.W. Mines, S. McKown, Y. Shen, W.J. Cantwell, residual stresses in laser clad AISI P20 tool steel on pre-hardened
W. Brooks, and C.J. Sutcliffe: The influence of processing wrought P20 substrate. Mater. Sci. Eng., A 527, 7265 (2010).
parameters on the mechanical properties of selectively laser melted 16. S. Ghosh and J. Choi: Modeling and experimental verification of
stainless steel micro lattice structures. J. Manuf. Sci. Eng. transient/residual stresses and microstructure formation in multi-
132, 041011 (2010). layer laser aided DMD process. J. Heat Transfer 128, 662 (2006).
7. M.K. Imran, S.H. Masood, M. Brandt, S. Bhattacharya, and 17. R. Colaco and R. Vilar: Effect of laser surface melting on the
J. Mazumder: Direct metal deposition (DMD) of H13 tool steel tempering behaviour of DIN X42Cr13 stainless tool steel. Scr.
on copper alloy substrate: Evaluation of mechanical properties. Mater. 38, 107 (1998).
Mater. Sci. Eng., A 528, 3342 (2011). 18. Tool Materials (ASM International, Materials Park, OH, 1995).
8. W. Hofmeister, M. Griffith, M. Ensz, and J. Smugeresky: Solidi- 19. R. Cottam, V. Luzin, Q. Liu, Y.C. Wong, J. Wang, and M. Brandt:
fication in direct metal deposition by LENS processing. JOM Investigation into heat treatment and residual stress in laser clad
53, 30 (2001). AA7075 powder on AA7075 substrate. Metallogr. Microstruct.
9. P.J. Maziasz, E.A. Payzant, M.E. Schlienger, and K.M. McHugh: Anal. (2013).
Residual stresses and microstructure of H13 steel formed by 20. H. Murakawa, M. Beres, C.M. Davies, S. Rashed, A. Vega,
combining two different direct fabrication methods. Scr. Mater. M. Tsunori, K.M. Nikbin, and D. Dye: Effect of low transformation
39, 1471 (1998). temperature weld filler metal on welding residual stress. Sci.
10. A.J. Pinkerton and L. Li: Direct additive laser manufacturing using Technol. Weld. Joining 15, 393 (2010).
gas- and water atomised H13 tool steel powders. Int. J. Adv. Manuf. 21. P.J. Withers and H.K.D.H. Bhadeshia: Residual stress. Part 2 – Nature
Technol. 25, 471 (2005). and origins. Mater. Sci. Technol. 17, 366 (2001).
11. K.M. McHugh, Y. Lin, Y. Zhou, and E.J. Lavernia: Influence of 22. O. Novelo-Peralta, G. Gonzales, and G.A. Lara-Rodriguez: Char-
cooling rate on phase formation in spray-formed H13 tool steel. acterization of precipitation in Al-Mg-Cu alloys by x-ray diffraction
Mater. Sci. Eng., A 477, 50 (2008). peak broadening analysis. Mater. Charact. 59, 773 (2008).
12. R.J. Moat, A.J. Pinkerton, L. Li, P.J. Withers, and M. Preuss: 23. L. Wang, S.D. Felicelli, and P. Pratt: Residual stresses in LENS-
Residual stresses in laser direct metal deposited Waspaloy. Mater. deposited AISI 410 stainless steel plates. Mater. Sci. Eng., A
Sci. Eng., A 528, 2288 (2011). 496, 234 (2008).
1986 J. Mater. Res., Vol. 29, No. 17, Sep 14, 2014