Grain size with properties

of steel!

1) The effect of cooling rate on grain size!

The micro structure (fine or coarse) depends on the cooling rate. Higher the
cooling rate –> finer the micro structure and hence Slower the rate –> coarser
the grain size.

Why???

For diffusive ( khuếch tán ) transformations ( biến đổi ), faster the cooling rate, finer
the grains. Greater the difference in temperature, greater the driving force – the phase
transformation tends ( xu hướng ) to happen quickly. For this, the atoms tend to travel
through smaller distances to complete the transformation. This results in finer grains.

2) Grain size affect the strength of steel!

+ The smaller the grain size, the higher the strength: This happens because of the
greater interactions between dislocations ( xô lệch / lệch / trật ) as the grain size and
the available room for their gliding through the lattice, is reduced.
+ Generally, as the grain size increases the strength decreases.

Why / Reason: All grains are separated by the grain boundaries. The strength is
generally attributed to the motion of dislocation. These grain boundaries acts as an
obstacle to the dislocations. If the grain sizes are small, the grain density (as in the
number of grains) would be high. These dislocations starts to pile up in the grain
boundaries.

The number of dislocations piling up plays a direct role in increasing the stress on the
grain boundaries. To be more precise, if there are ‘n’ dislocations, the stress acting on
the grain boundaries would be ‘n’ times the normal stress.

In large grain sized materials, the pile up of dislocations is high, i.e, ‘n’ value is high.
So, in these materials, there needs to be a lower value of stress applied to cause the
grain boundary to collapse when compared to the smaller grain sized material (as the
dislocations pile up is less).

This implies that, for a smaller stress value, the dislocations move freely in a larger
grain sized materials.

Conclusion: From the above information, we can conclude that the strength is
high in a material with smaller grain size.

+ Smaller grains stronger steel.

The strength of a material is often limited by its ability to produce and contain defects
in the crystal structure. As the number of grains increase so does the amount of
boundaries between the grains, these boundaries are effective at trapping defects.
This make the material stronger, though more brittle.

The easiest example of this is a paperclip. You can bend it, but it won’t bend back
perfectly. The area where the bend occurred now has a pileup of defects, making that
small area stronger and it will now resist moving again. Repeated bends or twists will
eventually cause it to lose its ductility, become more brittle, and break. This is called
‘work hardening’ and is one reason why swords ( kiếm ) were made of sheets folded
( các tấm thép gập lại ) and hammered many times instead of cast straight.
3) decreasing the grain size, we can increase
the strength. But is there any limit? Can we
continuously increase strength?

Decreasing the grain size is effective only to certain extent. Increase in strength of
material with decrease in grain size is due the fact that one of the major strengthening
mechanisms applicable in poly-crystalline materials (composition being a constant
factor), grain boundary strengthening comes into play.

Each grain can be estimated to be an array of perfectly arranged atoms based on

crystal structure of the material. Grain boundaries represent areas where grains of
different spatial orientation meet. Deformation in any material can be visualized as
movement of linear defects known as dislocations in an crystal lattice. For a
particular crystal structure, dislocations move in an preferred direction in an
preferred plane (generally the direction of highest atomic density in the plane of
highest atomic density). This movement will be impeded by the change in
orientation of crystals. With higher stress, the dislocation pile up begins to grow as
more and more dislocations get stuck at the same grain boundary. Also as stress
begins to increase, larger amount of dislocation are generated within the material.
When applied stress exceeds critical breaking stress of grain boundary, the
dislocations begin to flow through grain boundaries.

Now, smaller the grain size, higher is the grain boundary area per unit volume. So
there is a higher probability of an dislocation getting stuck at a grain boundaries.
Consequently, a higher concentration on dislocations can be accommodated in a unit
volume of material with lower grain size without allowing material to flow. This
leads to requirement of higher number of dislocations to begin flow of the material,
termed as “yielding” of material commonly. In this manner, smaller grains lead to
higher strength.
However, the relation reaches a breakdown point when grains become too
small. This limit has been identified experimentally to be about 10 nm. Below this
limit, further reduction of grain size in fact leads reduction in yield strength. This is
due to the fact that many other deformation mechanisms become dominant at
this range.

4) The effect of grain size on ductility

Finer the grains, greater is the stress required to yield a material (i.e dislocation
movement). because more grain boundaries per given area for a fine grains these
boundaries acts as barriers.

Consider a thought experiment: A road with number of pot holes with few pot holes.
Suppose if you were to pick a road, to travel in ease ,which according to you is easier
to move.

So here the pot holes are GRAIN BOUNDARIES and your vehicle movement is the

DISLOCATION movement.

or
strength +ductility= toughness.

So with grain size finer, the ductility is more.

Refer documents:

https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-effect-of-cooling-rate-on-grain-size

https://www.quora.com/How-does-grain-size-affect-the-strength-of-steel

https://www.quora.com/As-we-all-know-by-decreasing-the-grain-size-we-can-
increase-the-strength-But-is-there-any-limit-Or-is-it-we-can-continuously-increase-
strength-Does-that-mean-Nano-or-Pico-grain-size-material-has-the-highest-
strength

https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-effect-of-grain-size-on-ductility