Acta mater.

48 (2000) 2803±2813
www.elsevier.com/locate/actamat

RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE

TRANSFORMATIONS DURING THERMOMECHANICAL
PROCESSING AND TREATMENT OF TiAl-BASED ALLOYS
W.-J. ZHANG{{, U. LORENZ and F. APPEL
Institute for Materials Research, GKSS Research Center, 21502 Geesthacht, Germany

(Received 7 March 2000; accepted 28 March 2000)

AbstractÐThe conversion of the cast microstructure of a Ti±45Al±10Nb (at.%) ingot due to extrusion and
subsequent heat treatments was investigated using scanning and transmission electron microscopy. The
starting lamellar microstructure was broken down by dynamic recrystallization into a ®ne-grained duplex
microstructure after extrusion, however, a small amount of remnant lamellae was retained. It was found
that the ®ne substructures in the remnant lamellae varied from one area to another. Recrystallization and
phase boundary bulging were found to be the major mechanisms responsible for lamellar globularization.
The existence of remnant lamellae was ascribed to the anisotropic ¯ow behavior of the starting lamellar
colonies. Microstructural and process variables that in¯uence the scale of remnant lamellae will be eluci-
dated. Annealing in the …a ‡ g† two-phase ®eld cannot eliminate the remnant lamellar structures. However,
the detrimental e€ect of remnant lamellae can be minimized after alpha treatments provided that the rem-
nant lamellae are smaller than about 80 mm. 7 2000 Acta Metallurgica Inc. Published by Elsevier Science
Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Intermetallic compounds; Recrystallization & recovery; Phase transformations; Extrusion

1. INTRODUCTION structure through thermomechanical processing [3±

Gamma TiAl-based alloys have a variable potential
for high temperature structural applications. The in-
itial applications will probably involve as-cast ma-
terials in low-risk cases. But for higher risk
applications, the microstructural de®ciencies of cast
alloys are likely to be of great concern. Extensive
investigations over the past few years have demon-
strated [1±6] that hot working can reduce casting
inhomogeneity, re®ne the as-cast coarse grains, and
greatly improve the mechanical properties of the
product.
Typical thermomechanical processes for the
breakdown of TiAl ingots include isothermal for-
ging, conventional (canned) forging, and conven-
tional (canned) extrusion [1]. Prior to hot working,
the ingots are hot isostatically pressed (HIP) or
given a homogenization heat treatment prior to
working. The starting material generally has thus a
lamellar dominant microstructure. It is often di-
cult to completely break down the lamellar micro-
{ Formerly Alexander von Humboldt fellow, now with
the RD & E Center, Philip Morris USA, Richmond, VA
23234, USA.
{ To whom all correspondence should be addressed.
5]. The wrought microstructure generally consists of
®ne-grained recrystallized areas and some remnant
lamellar colonies. The amount of remnant lamellar
areas varies from approximately 5 to 60 vol.%
depending on the applied hot-working technique,
process variables and the initial lamellar grain size
[1, 4]. The existence of coarse remnant lamellar
areas is apparently detrimental to the mechanical
properties of wrought alloys. Therefore, how to
eliminate the remnant lamellar structure is an im-
portant point that needs to be considered during
processing of gamma alloys.
Previous work on the hot working of TiAl alloys
mostly focused on the processing related aspects [1±
6]. However, only a few of the studies are available
on the detail of the recovery and recrystallization
processes occurring during hot working and sub-
sequent annealing [7, 8]. In the present study, the
development of microstructure in a gamma alloy
was investigated by scanning and transmission elec-
tron microscopy after hot extrusion and subsequent
static heat treatment. Special attention was given to
the remnant lamellar areas, in an attempt to assess
the mechanisms of lamellar globularization. From
this study methods of how to break down the cast

1359-6454/00/$20.00 7 2000 Acta Metallurgica Inc. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S 1 3 5 9 - 6 4 5 4 ( 0 0 ) 0 0 0 9 3 - 8
2804 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
lamellar structure on a broader scale may be
suggested.
The alloy studied in this paper is a high Nb con-
taining TiAl-based alloy Ti±45Al±10Nb. Alloys
with this base composition are currently intensively
studied, because of their superior strength [9±11],
good oxidation resistance [12, 13] and excellent
creep resistance [14]. Due to the relatively high Nb
content, signi®cant changes of the phase boundaries
and transformation pathways have been recognized
in these alloys [15], which have to be considered for
the optimization of the hot working route.
Investigation of these related issues is the second
objective of the present paper.
Fig. 1. Conversion of the cast microstructure of a Ti±
45Al±10Nb ingot due to extrusion. BSE micrograph of (a)
the cast microstructure annealing at 12508C for 1.5 h (pre-
heat temperature for extrusion) and water quenching, and
(b) the microstructure after extrusion at 12508C to a re-
duction in area of 7:1. See text for the details. The radial
direction is vertical and the extrusion direction horizontal.
2. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES
The Ti±45Al±10Nb ingots measuring 70 mm in
diameter and 860 mm in length were HIP'ed at
12608C/175 MPa for 4 h. Cylindrical preforms were
machined from the as-received ingots, canned, and
then preheated at 12508C (a temperature high in
the a ‡ g ®eld) for about 1.5 h. After preheating,
the work pieces were extruded at a ram speed of
20 mm/s to a reduction in area of 7:1, followed by
air cooling. For subsequent heat treatments,
samples 10 mm in length were cut from the
extruded rods. Heat treatments were conducted at
11508C (a temperature low in the a ‡ g ®eld) for
10 min or 2 h and 13208C (the alpha transus tem-
perature) for 40 s or 5 min, respectively.
The as-received ingot material (diameter 70 mm)
and the extruded and extruded plus heat treated
samples (diameter 26 mm) were examined longitud-
inally at approximately the mid-radius locations.
Examination was performed on a Zeiss DSM962
scanning electron microscope in the backscattered
mode (BSE) and a Philips CM 200 transmission
electron microscope operated at 200 kV. Thin foils
for TEM were prepared by grinding and twin jet
polishing using a solution of 3% perchloric acid,
35% 2-butanol in methanol at ÿ358C at 20 V.
3. RESULTS
3.1. Microstructure prior to extrusion
The microstructure of the starting material may
be modi®ed during preheating. In order to study
possible e€ects, samples were subjected to the same
treatment as has been used for extrusion (that is
annealing at 12508C for 1.5 h), followed by water
quenching. As shown in Fig. 1(a), the material exhi-
bits a nearly fully lamellar microstructure with the
mean colony size of approximately of 450 mm,
which may be considered as the starting microstruc-
ture for extrusion. A small amount of equiaxed
gamma and alpha-two grains was observed along
the colony boundaries. In this and subsequent back-
scattered micrographs, the dark phase is gamma
(low atomic number) and the white phase is alpha
(or alpha-two) (high atomic number). In addition
there was a very small amount of beta phase.
Because the material was not homogenized, the
dark interdendritic Al-rich regions can be clearly
recognized. We also note that the lath orientations
of some lamellar colonies (I and II) are nearly par-
allel to the intended extrusion direction.
3.2. As-extruded microstructures
After extrusion the material shows a ®brous
microstructure at low magni®cation consisting of
``strung out'' prior lamellar colonies aligned in the
extrusion direction, Fig. 1(b). In most areas, the
 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
lamellae were completely broken down into globu-
larized duplex microstructure (areas A and D). The
details of these broken-down (BD) microstructure
are more readily seen in higher magni®cation micro-
graphs, Fig. 2(a). However, in some regions rem-
nant lamellar (RL) structures can still be seen, areas
B and C in Fig. 1(b) for example. In area B, the
Fig. 2. Microstructures observed after extrusion at 12508C
to a reduction in area of 7:1. BSE micrographs showing a
high magni®cation view of (a) the broken-down areas, and
(b) and (c) the remnant lamellar areas. See text for details.
The extrusion direction is horizontal in all micrographs.
2805
lamellar structure is nearly completely preserved
(just bent slightly), especially the regions consisting
of coarse alpha and thin gamma laths [marked as
arrows a and b in Fig. 2(b)]. In area C of Fig. 1(b),
many recrystallized gamma grains have formed and
this has resulted in the lamellae being broken into
fragments, see Fig. 2(c). Note that the remnant
lamellae are mostly closely oriented to the extrusion
direction [Fig. 1(b)] and the length of the remnant
lamellae varies from about 30 to 150 mm.
Figure 3 shows a view of the BD structure using
bright-®eld TEM. The BD areas are characterized
by a microstructure consisting of worked grains
(and subgrains) containing a high density of dislo-
cations and networks plus ®ne equiaxed grains
essentially free of dislocations. The small dislo-
cation-free grains could be the result of static
recrystallization during air cooling after extrusion.
The numerous grains which contain dislocations
must have recrystallized and subsequently under-
gone further working during extrusion; that is they
recrystallized dynamically. This hypothesis was sup-
ported by the ®ne equiaxed gamma grains (that are
recrystallized) observed in the BSE micrograph,
Fig. 2(a). The grain size distribution and volume
fraction of the statically recrystallized grains and
worked grains are presented in Fig. 4(a). The data
given were determined from at least 200 grains. As
can be seen, the mean grain size of the statically
recrystallized gamma grains is small (0.6 mm), but
their volume fraction is as high as 36%. This means
that static recrystallization occurred very fast during
air cooling after extrusion via the nucleation of
many new grains. The ®ne grain size of the worked
grains (0.9 mm) suggested that the BD areas were
deformed severely during hot extrusion.
The typical deformation substructures observed
in the RL areas are shown in Fig. 5. The lamellar
Fig. 3. TEM micrograph showing ®ne dislocation-free
grains (A and C) and worked grains (D and E) observed
in the BD areas. Extrusion at 12508C to a reduction in
area of 7:1.
2806 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
morphology was eventually preserved. As known,
the g and a(a2) phases in perfect lamellar structure
have the orientation relationships [16, 17]
…111†g ==…0001†a and  g ==h1120i
h110Š  a …1†
where the {111}g plane is parallel to the lamellar
boundaries. However, the Kikuchi patterns from
the adjacent laths (subgrains) gA, aA and gB indi-
cated a large misorientation of about 9 deg from
the perfect relationships given in equation (1). This
result suggests that the lamellae have been heavily
deformed during extrusion. In fact, the a laths were
converted by extensive deformation into ®ne sub-
grains (or grains) which exhibit di€erent contrasts
in Fig. 5 because of their misorientations. The de-
formation was inhomogeneous as indicated by the
di€erence of misorientations between subgrains.
There is a misorientation of 16 deg between the
Fig. 4. Distribution of grain sizes of statically recrystal-
lized gamma grains and worked (or recovered) gamma
grains measured using TEM in (a) as-extruded material
and (b) microstructure after extrusion followed by anneal-
ing at 11008C for 10 min and air cooling. The mean grain
size and volume fraction are given in the inset boxes.
adjacent subgrains aA and aB but only of 6 deg
between the top subgrain aA and the end subgrain
aE. Accordingly, a new recrystallized gamma grain
has formed between aA and aB (marked with arrow
1).
In the adjacent gamma laths (gA and gB), a high
density of dislocations and deformation twins was
observed, respectively. In heavily twinned laths
(that is gA), recrystallization was rarely observed. In
the dislocation-dominated laths gB, a few new
recrystallized grains were seen. Note that the new
grains gC tend to keep the orientation relationships
given in equation (1).
Figure 6 shows a high magni®cation view of the
®ne substructure of a gamma lath containing a high
density of dislocations. The gamma laths were sub-
divided into domains (gE and gF) by thin transverse
alpha laths aL. These alpha laths are likely to be
induced by adiabatic heating due to the defor-
mation during extrusion. In the gamma domains,
recovery has taken place, leading to the formation
of dislocation networks and low angle boundaries.
It is worth noting that the regions 1 ' and 2 ' (in
domains gE and gF, respectively) are almost free of
dislocations. They are neither recrystallized new
grains nor recovered subgrains because no bound-
aries between the dislocation-free region 1 ' and the
main domain 1 were present. The curvature of the
grain boundaries between these regions and the
adjacent a laths suggested that these clean areas
formed by growth of the gamma domains into a
laths after extrusion (during air cooling), that is by
a mechanism of phase (grain) boundary bulging [8].
The progress of phase boundary bulging can lead
to the breakdown of a laths. This e€ect is evident
in Fig. 5 at the sites marked with arrows 2 and 3.
Consistent with the BSE observations, the extent
of deformation subjected by the RL areas was
di€erent at di€erent sites. Figure 7 presents an
example of the RL areas which were only slightly
deformed. There were no subgrains in the a laths
and no evidence of phase boundary bulging. The
lamellar interfaces remained ¯at. Dislocation net-
works and low angle boundaries were observed in
the relatively coarse g lath E …00:8 mm† but not in
the thinner laths F±H (0.1±0.3 mm), see Fig. 7. It
should be noted that the mean lamellar interspacing
in this area of about 0.2 mm is much smaller than
that shown in Fig. 5 (0.9 mm).
3.3. Microstructures after heat treatment at 11508C
During annealing at 11508C, static recrystalliza-
tion occurred in the BD areas. The microstructure
after annealing for 10 min at 11508C was composed
mainly of ®ne recrystallized g grains almost free of
dislocations [Fig. 8(a)] and additionally a certain
number of recovered grains [Fig. 8(b)]. The volume
fraction of the recrystallized g grains increased from
 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS 2807

36% in the as-extruded state to 62% after anneal-
ing, Fig. 4. The spread of the size distribution curve
of the recrystallized grains to large values after
annealing [Fig. 4(b)] indicates that recrystallization
proceeds mainly by the growth of existing grains
and to a lesser extent by the nucleation of new
grains. The shift of the grain size distribution curve
of worked (recovered) grains to large grain sizes
after annealing suggests that the ®ner worked grains
were more easily consumed by the recrystallized
grains because of their higher stored energies.
In comparison, static recovery dominated in the
RL areas during annealing. The rearrangement of
dislocations leads to the formation of polygonized

Fig. 5. TEM micrograph showing the ®ne structures in a heavily deformed remnant lamellar area; the
inset Kikuchi patterns indicate the misorientation between di€erent grains or subgrains. Note that the
prior continuous alpha laths were broken up at the sites marked with arrows 1±3. See text for more
details.
2808 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS

Fig. 6. TEM micrograph showing the substructures of a gamma lath in remnant lamellar areas. See
text for details.

subgrains, Fig. 8(c). New recrystallized grains can
be occasionally observed like the grain of 9 deg mis-
orientation shown in Fig. 8(c). As a result, the evi-
dence of the RL regions can still be seen as coarse
elongated g grains plus segments of a laths even
after 2 h annealing at 11508C, Fig. 8(d); in contrast
the BD areas exhibit a uniform, ®ne-grained dual
structure.
3.4. Microstructures after heat treatment at 13208C
During heat treatment at 13208C (the alpha
transus temperature), the g 4 a transformation
takes place in a di€erent manner in the BD and RL
regions. In the BD areas, new alpha grains were
formed along the grain boundaries and/or on dislo-
cations within the gamma grain interior after 40 s

Fig. 7. TEM micrograph of the microstructure of a slightly deformed remnant lamellar area in the as-
extruded material. Note that dislocation networks and low angle boundaries developed in the coarse
lath E, but are almost absent in the thinner laths F±H.
 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS 2809

at 13208C, Fig. 9(a). It is important to note that the
new alpha grains are randomly oriented as con-
®rmed by the Kikuchi patterns. In contrast, in the
RL regions the transformation proceeds simply by
the thickening of remnant alpha laths, Fig. 9(b).
Because the segments of the alpha laths within one
RL area have nearly the same orientation, a certain
RL area is expected to be completely transformed
into a single alpha grain. Therefore, the grain size
of the newly formed alpha grain (or the lamellar
colony after cooling) will be limited by the size of
the RL area. The existence of coarse RL areas will
thus result in the formation of unusually large
lamellar colonies. Recall that the RL areas are gen-
erally oriented nearly parallel to the extrusion direc-
tion. The lamellar colonies descended from prior
RL areas must therefore have their lamellar orien-
tations close to such directions, because the g/a
laths keep the orientation relationship given in
equation (1) during the phase transformation.
Figure 9(c) shows a nearly fully lamellar micro-
structure developed after heat treatment at 13208C
for 5 min followed by furnace cooling. The distri-
bution of the grain sizes with respect to their lamel-
lae orientations of about 200 lamellar colonies is
presented in Fig. 10. The lamellar colonies are ran-
domly oriented except for a weak tendency of tex-
ture around y ˆ 108 and 508 (y is the angle between
lamellar boundaries and the extrusion direction).
Moreover, the distribution of grain sizes is uniform
with respect to the lamellae orientations. There was
no preferred alignment of coarse lamellar colonies

Fig. 8. TEM micrographs showing (a) new recrystallized gamma grains and (b) recovered grains
observed in the BD areas and (c) polygonized subgrains formed in the remnant gamma laths after heat
treatment at 11008C for 10 min followed by air cooling. The angles marked in (c) are the misorienta-
tions between the subgrains with respect to subgrain A. (d) BSE micrograph showing ®ne equiaxed
grains developed in prior BD areas and coarse lamellae formed in prior RL areas after heat treatment
at 11008C for 2 h followed by air cooling.
2810 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
Fig. 9. Formation of alpha phase (a) via nucleation of ran-
domly oriented alpha grains (A±C) in the BD areas (TEM
micrograph) and (b) via thickening of residual alpha laths
in the RL areas (BSE micrograph) after heat treatment at
13208C for 40 s and air cooled. (c) BSE micrograph of the
near-fully lamellar microstructure developed after heat
treatment at 13208C for 5 min and furnace cooled.
near y ˆ 08 (with the lamellae orientations nearly
parallel to the extrusion direction). One exception
which is suspected to be evolved from prior coarse
RL structure is the colony B shown in Fig. 9(c).
This colony has an unusually large grain size of
about 250 mm and a lamellar orientation of y ˆ 258
with respect to the extrusion direction.
Fig. 10. Grain size distribution of the lamellar colonies
with respect to their orientation in the microstructure heat
treated at 13208C for 5 min and furnace cooled. y is the
angle between the lamellar boundaries and the extrusion
direction. A weak texture was indicated around y ˆ 108
and 508.
4. DISCUSSION
4.1. Origin of the remnant lamellar structure
The existence of remnant lamellar (RL) areas in
wrought TiAl alloys can be ascribed to the aniso-
tropic plastic behavior of lamellar colonies. The
yield stress of lamellar TiAl strongly depends on
the angle f between the lamellar boundaries and
the loading axis. When the loading axis is perpen-
dicular to lamellar boundaries …f ˆ 908), the yield
stress is the highest …sy ˆ 260 MPa at 11008C)
according to the data estimated on PST crystal [18].
In this direction, the deformation must propagate
through the lamellar interfaces, and the a2 phase
has to deform in its hardest slip mode (pyramidal
slip). When the lamellar boundaries are inclined at
an intermediate angle to the loading axis, the lamel-
lar colonies easily deform by shear parallel to the
interfacial planes …sy 070 MPa at 11008C). When
the lamellar boundaries are parallel to the loading
axis …f ˆ 08), the yield stress is moderately high
…sy ˆ 180 MPa at 11008C) [18].
Therefore, during the ®rst stage of hot working,
the lamellar colonies in soft orientations will exten-
sively deform, whereas the colonies in hard orien-
tations were deformed to a much lesser extent. As a
result, dynamic recrystallization proceeds in the soft
lamellar colonies and at colony boundaries [1]. The
lamellae in these areas are broken down into ®ne
recrystallized grains (the BD areas), making these
areas even softer. Additional plastic ¯ow due to
subsequent processing is then readily accommo-
dated by these softened BD areas. At the same
time, it is very dicult to impart plastic work into
the hard lamellar areas. At the end of processing,
 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
the hot work accumulated in the hard areas was
not large enough to induce any recrystallization
(Fig. 7), or the recrystallization occurred in a low
nucleation density which is not suciently e€ective
for a breakdown of the lamellar structures (Fig. 5).
These areas were ®nally retained as the remnant
lamellar (RL) regions. This interpretation is consist-
ent with the fact that remnant lamellae mostly have
their lamellar boundaries parallel to the extrusion
direction [Fig. 1(b)], that is in a hard orientation.
This observation agrees with previous studies on
forged TiAl alloys, which demonstrated that the
lamellar boundaries of remnant lamellae are perpen-
dicular to the forging direction [3, 4].
4.2. How to reduce the remnant lamellar structure?
As shown in Fig. 5, the two mechanisms respon-
sible for lamellar globularization are recrystalliza-
tion and phase boundary bulging (the former being
more e€ective). To achieve more e€ective recrystal-
lization, it is necessary to impart more hot work
into the hard lamellar areas as discussed above.
From a microstructural point of view, a ®ne colony
size guarantees more uniform deformation. Thus,
the lamellar breakdown must be easier to achieve in
®ne-grained lamellar microstructures as con®rmed
by previous works [1, 19]. The second factor to be
considered is the lamellar interspacing. Reducing
the interlamellar spacing will provide more inter-
facial barriers to deformation in hard oriented
lamellar colonies and thus increases their hardness.
In this context, ®ne interspacing is likely to be detri-
mental to lamellar structure breakdown. As shown
in Fig. 7, the dislocation density in ®ner gamma
laths is much lower than that in coarse laths.
Furthermore, the extent of deformation and recrys-
tallization in the RL areas with relatively coarse
lamellar interspacing (Fig. 5) is higher than that
with ®ner interlamellar spacing (Fig. 7). The e€ect
of lamellar interspacing on globularization has to
be con®rmed by further studies.
Concerning process variables, the preheating tem-
perature seems to be quite important. At higher
temperature (in the alpha plus gamma ®eld), the
improved workability of the materials allows the
imparting of more plastic strain and thus leads to a
more homogeneous deformation of the lamellar
microstructure. Also, the alpha laths formed at
these high working temperatures are thermodynami-
cally more unstable when cooled to low temperature
after processing (because of their higher supersatu-
rated Al concentrations). This results in a larger
driving force (chemical energy in addition to strain
energy) for the globularization of alpha laths via
recrystallization and/or via phase boundary bulging
(of gamma grains). The bene®cial e€ect of higher
working temperature was demonstrated by the so-
called ``alpha forging'' approach [1]. This approach
2811
comprised preheating high in the a ‡ g ®eld, cooling
as rapidly as possible to an isothermal forging tem-
perature substantially lower within this two-phase
®eld, followed by instantaneous forging. The ``alpha
forged'' pancake contained much less remnant
lamellar structure than that produced by standard
isothermal forging practice. Furthermore, the extent
and volume fraction of remnant lamellae in the
pancake conventionally forged at 12508C were
found to be smaller than those (conventionally)
forged at 11508C [5]. Oehring et al. [19] also
demonstrated that extrusion at 13008C (in the a ‡ g
two-phase ®eld) leads to more homogeneous micro-
structures as compared with extrusion at 12508C.
In addition to the working temperature, the
strain rate is another critical factor. At higher stain
rates, more work is expected to be put into the
hard lamellar colonies due to work hardening of
the soft colonies (and the later BD areas) and thus
bene®t in breaking up the lamellar microstructure
on a broader scale. The reduced amount of remnant
lamellar microstructure observed in the convention-
ally forged pancakes was attributed by Semiatin et
al. [5] to the higher strain rates imposed as com-
pared with those used for isothermal forging.
4.3. In¯uence of the remnant lamellae on the ®nal
microstructures
After heat treatment in the alpha plus gamma
two-phase ®eld, the BD areas exhibit a ®ne recrys-
tallized duplex structure but the RL areas remained
as lamellae consisting of coarse elongated gamma
laths plus short alpha segments, Fig. 8(d). The rem-
nant lamellar structures cannot be eliminated even
after high-temperature heat treatment at 12608C for
2 h [5]. We believe this is because recovery rather
than recrystallization dominated in the RL areas
during annealing, Fig. 8(c). Even if recrystallization
occurred in some RL areas, Fig. 5, the nucleation
density of new grains is relatively low and these
new grains tend to keep the orientation relation-
ships given in equation (1). Thus, the characteristics
of the lamellar structure were preserved. Such unu-
sual recrystallization behavior was also found in
cold-rolled PST crystals of TiAl [7]. During anneal-
ing at 9008C, recrystallization occurred in a manner
without disturbing the lamellar orientation relation-
ship in the specimens cold rolled to less than 20%.
But randomly oriented new grains were formed as
the deformation became greater than 40%.
The existence of remnant lamellar microstructure
after annealing is apparently detrimental to the
mechanical properties of the alloys. A strong orien-
tation dependence of fracture toughness with
respect to the extrusion direction was observed in
the studied Ti±45Al±10Nb alloys after annealing at
10308C for 2 h; the fracture toughness KQ measured
perpendicular to the extrusion direction is higher
2812 ZHANG et al.: RECOVERY, RECRYSTALLIZATION AND PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
(25.2 MPa/m1/2) than that (17.6 MPa/m1/2) parallel
to the extrusion direction [20]. Such anisotropic
behavior cannot be simply explained by the weak
textures observed [20], but may more likely be re-
lated (at least partially) to the remnant lamellar
microstructure. A low fracture toughness was
observed as microcracks propagate along the (rem-
nant) lamellar interfaces [21], which are preferen-
tially aligned parallel to the extrusion direction.
After heat treatment in the single alpha phase
®eld, the in¯uence of the RL structure seems not so
pronounced, as demonstrated in Fig. 9(c). As men-
tioned earlier, the existence of coarse RL areas can
result in the formation of unusually large alpha
grains. However, the existence of small RL areas
may not in¯uence the ®nal lamellar microstructure
achieved after alpha treatment. The data in Fig. 10
indicate that the growth of new alpha grains in the
wrought materials is very fast during the ®rst few
minutes of alpha treatments. After 5 min at 13208C,
most of the alpha grains have a grain size larger
than 80 mm. Consistent with this fact, the ®nest
fully lamellar microstructure obtained in wrought
TiAl alloys up to date has a mean colony size of
about 120 mm [2]. Thus, the presence of RL areas in
wrought TiAl may not coarsen the ®nal lamellar
microstructures provided that the remnant lamellae
are kept smaller than a critical size of about 80 mm.
The growth of the RL areas is considered to be
marginal during the ®rst few minutes of alpha treat-
ments because the conversion of remnant g ‡ a
lamellae into alpha grains (which is a slow ledge-
controlled process) will not be completed within
such a short time [22].
Finally, the present investigation demonstrated
that the high-strength Ti±45Al±10Nb alloy can be
successfully processed by the conventional tech-
niques used for conventional TiAl-based alloys.
Because in this study the material was extruded at a
temperature in the …a ‡ g† two-phase ®eld (e.g.
12508C) [15], the B2 phase was rarely observed in
all the microstructures being examined. Therefore,
the conclusions drawn from the current investi-
gation are believed to be applicable to the conven-
tional TiAl-based alloys.
5. SUMMARY
1. The large lamellar colonies present in the cast
Ti±45Al±10Nb ingot were converted by hot
extrusion into a mixture of mostly ®ne globular-
ized microstructure with a small fraction of rem-
nant lamellae.
2. The globularized microstructure consisted of
worked grains (dynamically recrystallized) which
contained a high density of dislocations and net-
works, plus equiaxed dislocation-free grains
(statically recrystallized). Both have very ®ne
grain sizes in the range 0.2±2 mm.
3. Recrystallized grains were occasionally observed
in some remnant lamellar areas and these new
grains grew in a manner of preserving the lamel-
lar characteristics. Recrystallization and phase
boundary bulging were found to be the major
mechanisms responsible for lamellar globulariza-
tion.
4. The existence of remnant lamellae in wrought
TiAl was ascribed to the strong anisotropic de-
formation behavior of lamellar colonies. The
amount of remnant lamellar structure is expected
to be reduced by decreasing the initial lamellar
colony size, increasing the interlamellar spacing,
preheating the work pieces to higher temperature
and processing at a relatively high strain rate.
5. The remnant lamellae were dicult to remove by
annealing in the alpha plus gamma two-phase
®eld because recovery dominated in these rem-
nant lamellar areas during annealing. However,
the detrimental e€ect of remnant lamellae can be
minimized by alpha treatments provided that the
remnant lamellar areas are smaller than a size of
about 80 mm.
AcknowledgementsÐThe authors acknowledge helpful dis-
cussions and assistance from Drs J. Paul, U. Brossmann
and M. Oehring. One of the authors (W.J.Z.) would like
to thank the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for
®nancial support. He is also in debt to the support from
Professor R. Wagner (JuÈlich Research Center, Germany)
and Professor G. L. Chen (University of Science and
Technology Beijing, P.R. China).
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