Accepted Manuscript

Effect of tool pin design on the microstructural evolutions and tribological char-
acteristics of friction stir processed structural steel

Ameneh Amirafshar, Hesam Pouraliakbar

PII: S0263-2241(15)00115-3
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.measurement.2015.02.051
Reference: MEASUR 3296

To appear in: Measurement

Received Date: 23 October 2014

Revised Date: 7 February 2015
Accepted Date: 25 February 2015

Please cite this article as: A. Amirafshar, H. Pouraliakbar, Effect of tool pin design on the microstructural evolutions
and tribological characteristics of friction stir processed structural steel, Measurement (2015), doi: http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/j.measurement.2015.02.051

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 Effect of tool pin design on the microstructural evolutions and tribological
characteristics of friction stir processed structural steel

Ameneh Amirafshar a,b

a
Department of Materials Engineering, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box 14115-143, Tehran, Iran
b
Iranian Welding Research and Engineering Center (IWREC), University of Applied Science and
Technology, Tehran, Iran

Hesam Pouraliakbar b,c,*

b
Iranian Welding Research and Engineering Center (IWREC), University of Applied Science and
Technology, Tehran, Iran
c
Department of Advanced Materials, WorldTech Scientific Research Center (WT-SRC), Tehran, Iran
*Corresponding author, E-mail: hpouraliakbar@worldtech-src.com, h.pouraliakbar@gmail.com;
Tel: +98 912 324 5466

Abstract

In this research, friction stir processing (FSP) technique is applied for the surface modification of ST14

structural steel. Tungsten carbide tools with cylindrical, conical, square and triangular pin designs are

used for surface modification at rotational speed of 400 rpm, normal force of 5 KN and traverse speed of

100 mm.min-1. Mechanical and tribological properties of the processed surfaces including

microhardness and wear characteristics are studied in detail. Furthermore, microstructural evolutions and

worn surfaces are investigated by optical and scanning electron microscopes. Based on the achievements,

all designed pins were successfully applicable for low carbon steel to produce defect-free processed

material. By the microstructural changes within the stirred zone, the processed specimen is obtained

higher mechanical properties. This is due to the formation of fine grains as the consequence of imposing

intensive plastic deformation during FSP; however, this issue is highlighted by using square pin design. In

this case, minimum grain size of 5 µm and maximum hardness of 320 VHN, as well as, maximum wear

resistance are all examined for the specimen modified by square pin.

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Keywords: Friction stir processing; Surface modification; Tool pin design; Wear; Tribology; Structural

steel.

Introduction

Friction stir processing (FSP) is a solid-state technique where modification of similar and/or dissimilar

metal plates is achieved through a thermo-mechanical action exerted by a non-consumable tool onto metal

surface. FSP was invented at TWI in 1991 [1, 2] and was an emerging technology of the friction stir

welding (FSW) [3, 4]. More details on FSP/W can be found in literature [5].

FSP is applied for microstructural modification in order to enhance mechanical properties via localized

grain refinement [6]. The material flow behaviour is predominantly influenced by the applied tool pin

design, tool dimension and processing parameters [7]. Ma et al. [8] reported superplasticity in aluminium

alloys subjected to the grain refinement by FSP. Also, it was reported that the FSP technique could be

applied to produce bulk ultrafine-grained alloys based on the principles of severe plastic deformation

techniques [9-11]. In addition, attempts have been done to investigate the influence of tool pin shape on

the microstructural changes and subsequent mechanical properties of FSW/Ped materials [12-18].

The pin geometry is known as the most important parameter in the FSW/P technique [5, 12-14]. Pin

design influences heat generation, material plastic flow and subsequently affects the homogeneity of the

processed zone [14-16]. A non-consumable tool consists of a shoulder and a pin. The shoulder generates

most of the required heat and prevents the plasticized material escaping from work-piece surface while

both the shoulder and the pin notably influence material flow [5, 16, 18]. Recently, it is revealed that the

detailed tool design is critical in achieving sound processed zone with characteristic mechanical

properties [11]. Also, both process forces and the plastic flow in vicinity of the rotating tool are

considerably attributed to the pin geometry [19]. Various tool pin designs are used by researchers;

however, the most are threaded and rotated in such a way that the threads push the stirred metal towards

downward side of the pin and away from the shoulder [5, 20, 21].

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The aim of the present work is to study the correlation between applied tool pin design, microstructural

evolutions and obtained surface performance for the ST14 structural steel. Doing this, optical and

scanning electron microscopy-assisted observations, as well as, microhardness and pin-on-disk wear

resistance measurements are conducted to study the tribological characteristics of the processed

specimens.

Experimental procedure

As-received 2 mm thick ST14 structural steel as the parent material is subjected to single-pass FSP

process. Modified conventional vertical milling machine (Machine Sazi Tabriz (MST), FP4M model) is

used as the FSP unit in this study. Tungsten carbide tools containing different pin profiles are used for

low carbon steel specimens. Applied tools’ design and dimensions are detailed in Table 1, accordingly.

For tool production, commercial tungsten alloy rods (φ=20 mm, length= 100 mm) were cut, machined

and sized. Then, prepared tools were subjected to a specific gas-carburizing treatment in order to enhance

their surface stiffness, erosion resistance and hardness by developing some tungsten carbide phases within

their superficial layers. This was done in order to avoid further damage of tool while its insertion into the

steel specimens. Four different pin profiles, that are, cylindrical, conical, square and triangular are used

for processing while the height of the pin was constant at 1.8 mm for all profiles. The details of the tools

are listed in Table 1. For forging action at the trailing edge of the shoulder, approximate tool tilt angle of

3° is considered. This was consistent with previous published literature [22]. The tool rotation (ω) and

traverse speed (υ) are set into 400 rpm and 100 mm.min-1, respectively. Meanwhile constant normal force

of 5 KN is set for all FSP specimens. According to what Commin et al. [23] reported, considering the ω/υ

ratio constant during processing could keep the stir zone temperature constant in all specimens. Prevailing

metallographic stages are conducted using successive grounding, polishing and etching by Nital. Cross-

section microstructural studies are performed by optical microscope (Olympus, PME3-PU model) and

scanning electron microscope (Philips, XL30 model). Transverse hardness profiles are plotted by using

Vickers digital microhardness tester (Leitz, Miniload model). Hardness measurements were carried out on

3
FSPed specimens by applying the load of 5 N and dwelling time of 10 s. The reported values were the

average of different readings. Also, friction coefficient and dry wear behaviour of processed steel in

addition to parent metal are evaluated using a pin-on-disc tribometer (Arca Sanat Arvin). The flat disc of

tester machine was made of AISI D3 steel with hardness of 58 HRc and surface roughness of 0.2 µm. The

wear tests are carried out for total 1000 m travel distance considering 250 m intervals. At each interval,

sample is cleaned in alcohol and the wear weight loss is obtained with approximate accuracy of ±0.01 mg.

The friction force is recorded automatically against sliding distance by the tester software. Finally, the

worn surfaces are examined by scanning electron microscope (SEM).

Result and discussion

Microscopic observations

Fig. 1 shows the optical microscopy images acquired from the base and processed low carbon steel

specimens. According to Fig. 1(a), original microstructure of base material primarily consists of

ferrite grains with average grain size of 34 µm. Fig. 1(b-e) show optical images obtained from the centre

of the stirred zones of the FSPed steel with different pin profiles. By using an image analyzer software

(A4I Docu software), average grain size of 25, 18, 9 and 5µm, are measured for specimens processed by

conical, cylindrical, triangular and square pins, respectively. The grain refinement is attributed to the

severe plastic deformation and recrystallization occurred during the FSP [1, 6]. Moreover, the excess

turbulence of the plasticized material and/or great amount of material flow by using triangular pin, as well

as, pulsating action during processing with square pin causes further grain refinement. Insufficient

vertical flow of the plasticized material i.e. resulted from lesser created downward force as the driving

force, eventuated coarser grains within the material processed with cylindrical and conical pins. Effect of

pin profile in further grain refinement is also consistent with its contact surface with processed material as

previously discussed by Motalleb-nejad et al. [24]. Based on microscopical observations, general defects

such as voids and cracks are not observed within the processed zones due to severe and rapid deformation

while sound stirred zones are obtained by all applied pin designs.

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Microhardness measurements

The hardness of a material is decisively affected by its grain size, so that, by decreasing the grain size,

hardness will be increased. FSP imposes a lot of plastic deformation which increases material dislocation

density. The grain and sub-grain boundaries thus become the main obstacle to the slip of dislocations and

the materials with a smaller grain size would have higher hardness or strength as it might impose more

restriction to the dislocation movement. This discussion is also claimed in many materials science

literatures [12, 24, 25]. Microhardness measurements are performed on the cross-section of samples (Fig.

2). In the FSPed material with square pin profile, the surface hardness reached to 320 VHN which was

substantially higher than that of other samples. The presence of finer grains within the processed region

compared with starting material was the only reason for this enhancement. According to literature, FSP

has been shown to be accompanied by dynamic recrystallization in ferrous alloys [5, 24, 26]. Meanwhile,

hardness of specimen processed by triangular pin was higher than that for specimens with both cylindrical

and conical designs due to more plastic deformation and subsequent recrystallization taken place by using

triangular profile. From figure, maximum achieved hardness for specimens processed by triangular,

cylindrical and conical pin profiles were 311, 292 and 275 VHN, respectively. In addition, the oscillation

in hardness profile could be attributed to the formation of the onion rings within the stirred zone and/or

different orientation of the grains [27]. In fact, decreasing of the hardness is an effect of larger grain

growth. Moreover, the hardness profile shows that the heat affected zone (HAZ) exists in the material

where the hardness of the HAZ is examined lower than that of the base material.

For more details, the maximum examined hardness values of the stirred zones are plotted vs. both grain

size and inverse square root of the grain sizes in Fig. 3. As mentioned, for measured average hardness

data, an equation in the form of the Hall-Petch linear relationship could be stated from Fig. 3(b) as

follows:

VHN = 242.59 + 191.29 d-0.5 (1)

where VHN is the maximum microhardness of the stirred zone and d is average grain size of the

corresponding processed specimen. Eq. (1) shows that the finer grain sizes resulted in higher hardness

5
values and strength of the material due to the fact that finer grains included more grain boundaries which

could be the main obstacles to the slip of the dislocations [28].

Tribological characteristics

Fig. 4 illustrates the tribological behavior of FSPed ST14 steel obtained by pin-on-disk wear test method.

Accordingly, Fig. 4(a) plots the wear weight loss vs. sliding distance for processed specimens. As can be

seen, weight loss increases with increasing sliding distance. From figure, the rate of weight loss for the

processed material by using conical pin design is highlighted than those of that for others since the

minimum rate is obtained by square pin. The wear curves are characterized by defining two different wear

characteristics of unsteady and constant which correspond to initial wear and steady-state conditions. The

variations of wear rate (weight loss content for unit of sliding distance) vs. sliding distance for processed

materials are shown in Fig. 4(b). Comparing Fig. 4(a) and 4(b), it is found that both trends for weight loss

and wear rate are significantly lower in specimens processed by square pin. The improvement in wear

resistance is related to higher hardness values as a result of microstructural evolutions and grain

refinement while FSP [4, 12]. Fig. 4(c) shows the variation of friction coefficient vs. siding distance. In

dry sliding contact, the steady-state friction coefficient for FSPed material with square pin was minimum

since processing by conical pin concludes maximum coefficient. As the magnitudes of the run-in-friction

coefficient for processed materials are different, they must be related to the difference in the extent of

localized severe plastic deformation at real contact areas at the early stage of the tests [29].

Fig 5 illustrates the SEM micrographs of worn surface in FSPed samples. There was an evidence of

material removal on the surface processed by conical pin (Fig. 5(a)). In Fig 5(a) the material removal

implied local joining/welding at the interface and subsequent rupture of the joint accompanied by the

groove formation. It is concluded that predominant wear initiation mechanism for this surface was

adhesion which converted to abrasion in further stages. Detailed examinations revealed that the role of

both adhesion and abrasion mechanisms get decreased due to having a comparatively lower friction

coefficient and higher hardness in material surface modified by conical pin. From Fig. 5(d), a smooth

6
wear surface containing grooves for specimen processed by square pin is evident. Based on microscopical

observations, it is concluded that tool pin profile could strongly affect the wear characteristics of ST14

steel.

Summary and conclusions

Surface modification of ST14 steel is performed through FSP technique by using different tool pin

designs. Microscopical and mechanical examinations are carried out to find out the characteristics of

stirred zone influenced by altering the pin profile and obtained results are summarized as follows:

1. Tool pin designs of cylindrical, conical and triangular, as well as, square are all successfully

applicable for ST14 steel to produce defect-free processed material.

2. Among the various pin profiles which are used, the average grain size obtained with square profile

was 5 µm which was the minimum as compared to the sizes of 25, 18, 9 µm obtained with conical,

cylindrical and triangular pins, respectively. Therefore, the maximum achieved grain refinement was

85.3% by square pin considering the primary grain size of 34 µm for the starting material.

3. Highlighted microstructural evolutions obtained by square pin in FSP by considering the tool

rotational rate of 400 rpm and traverse speed of 100 mm.min-1 resulted in maximum hardness of 320

VHN for stirred zone due to the more imposed plastic deformation content and subsequent formation

of grain boundaries rather than other applied pins.

4. According to the obtained pin-on-disc wear test results, it was revealed that specimen which was

FSPed by square pin design examined lower weight-loss rate vs. sliding distance since specimen

processed by conical pin concluded maximum rate. This was also consistent with wear rate results.

Consequently, ST14 steel specimen was undergone surface modification by square pin exhibited the

greatest wear resistance. This was related to its hardness and microstructural evolutions influenced by

the higher content of plastic deformation during processing and also governed by final grain size. The

worn surface study results were in good conformance with pre-discussed achievements.

7
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 Table 1: The details and dimensions of the designed FSP tools.

Description of Shoulder
Shoulder diameter Pin height Pin dimensions
Series the designed concavity
(mm) (mm) (mm)
pin (degree)
Greatest diameter (φ1) = 6.5;
1 Conical 16 1.8 2
smallest diameter (φ2) = 5.5
2 Cylindrical 16 1.8 Diameter (φ) = 6 2
3 Triangular 16 1.8 Side (a) = 6 2
4 Square 16 1.8 Side (a) = 6 2

11
Fig. 1. Optical microscopy images showing microstructure of (a) as-received ST14 steel as well as FSPed

steel by using (b) conical, (c) cylindrical, (d) triangular, and (e) square pin profiles.

12
 Fig. 2. Microhardness variation plots for FSPed ST14 steel by using different pin designs.

Fig. 3. Correlations of the maximum examined microhardness within the stirred zone of FSPed specimens

with (a) the average grain size, and (b) the inverse square root of the average grain size.

13
Fig. 4. Plots showing examined test results of (a) weight loss, (b) wear rate, and (c) friction coefficient vs.

sliding distance for FSPed ST14 steel by using different pin designs.

14
Fig. 5. SEM micrographs illustrating obtained worn surfaces for FSPed ST14 steel by using (a) conical,

(b) cylindrical, (c) triangular, and (d) square pin designs.

15
Research Highlights

• Cylindrical, conical, square, and triangular tool pin profiles are applied.

• FSP was utilized to fabricate defect-free processed structural steel specimens.

• The specimen using square pin profile exhibited maximum hardness and finer grains.

• Wear resistant and friction coefficient by square pin are obtained minimum values.

16
Graphical abstract