Materials Letters 284 (2021) 128917

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Materials Letters
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mlblue

Effects of ultrasonic peening treatment layer by layer on microstructure

of components fabricated by wire and arc additive manufacturing
Yinbao Tian a,b,⇑, Junqi Shen b,⇑, Shengsun Hu b, Jian Han a, Qian Wang a, Yangchuan Cai a
a
School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tianjin University of Technology, Tianjin, China
b
School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: To improve the coarse grains of Al alloy, the ultrasonic peening treatment layer by layer was used during
Received 4 October 2020 wire and arc additive manufacturing process of Al alloy. The severe deformation layer of last deposited
Received in revised form 24 October 2020 layer was remelted when a new layer was deposited. In an Al alloy component, the matrix and transition
Accepted 26 October 2020
layer were formed alternately. The pore was compressed under the effect of ultrasonic peening treat-
Available online 28 October 2020
ment, which led to a decrease of pore diameter. The equiaxed grain area was formed due to the aniso-
tropy in grain growth and the increase of nucleation particles. In equiaxed grain area, the grains with
Keywords:
a diameter of 200–400 nm, dislocation wall and dislocation tangle were formed.
Metals and alloys
Additive manufacturing
Ó 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Ultrasonic peening treatment
Microstructure
Nanoparticles

1. Introduction 2. Experiments

Wire and arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) technique has
many advantages, which includes high energy efficiency, high
deposition rate and low equipment costs [1,2]. Many large compo-
nents with medium geometric complexity are fabricated by WAAM
technology [3,4]. An Al-6 Mg component was fabricated by WAAM
technique using cold metal transfer (CMT) [5]. An Al-3.1 Mg-2.0Si
component was obtained by feeding ER5087 + ER4043 wires using
WAAM technology [6].
According to the reference [7], for a component with Ti-6Al-4V/
AlSi5 dissimilar alloy, the porosity occurred in Al alloy. Porosity
resulted in a degradation of mechanical properties of Al alloy [8].
Besides, a large number of dendritic grains were formed at the
middle and top of Al alloy. The coarse dendritic grains deteriorated
the mechanical property of the component. Thereby, ultrasonic
peening treatment (UPT) layer by layer on Al alloy surface was
used. The effects of UPT layer by layer on Al alloy on porosity
and microstructure of Al component were studied.
TC4 and ER4043 wires were used as the deposition materials.
The wires composition was same as that in the reference [7]. Direct
current CMT mode was used. The wire feed speeds of Ti and Al
alloys were 7.2 m/min and 4 m/min, respectively. The travel speed
was 0.3 m/min. Ti alloy with 15 layers was deposited on a TC4 sub-
strate and then Al alloy with 65 layers was deposited on the last Ti
layer. The fabricating process was shielded using argon gas at a
flow rate of 20 L/min. During Al alloy deposition process, for sam-
ple 1, Al alloy layers were no treated. However, for sample 2, Al
alloy layers were treated with UPT by layer and layer using an
HJ-III type ultrasonic peening device. The transverse metallo-
graphic samples were polished and etched ~50 s using a Keller
solution. The microstructures were analyzed by an optical micro-
scope, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with an energy disper-
sive spectroscopy (EDS), and transmission electron microscopy
(TEM).

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Porosity of Al alloy

⇑ Corresponding authors at: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tianjin As shown in Fig. 1(a), in sample 1, a large number of pores were
University, Tianjin 300354, China. formed during Al alloy WAAM process. A pore was round in shape
E-mail addresses: tianyinbao@tju.edu.cn (Y. Tian), shenjunqi@tju.edu.cn (J. in Fig. 1(b). The pore diameter was ~70 mm. The round pores were
Shen). the hydrogen pores [9]. Molten Al absorbed hydrogen during

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matlet.2020.128917
0167-577X/Ó 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Y. Tian, J. Shen, S. Hu et al.
Fig. 1. Porosity of components: (a) polished cross section in sample 1, (b) porosity morphology of sample 1, (c) polished cross section of sample 2 and (d) porosity
morphology at TL in sample 2.
WAAM process, which led to the formation of porosity in a compo-
nent. According to the reference [9], the severe deformation layer
(SDL) and transition layer (TL) were formed after the Al alloy sur-
face was treated by UPT. The SDL of last deposited layer was
remelted when a new layer was deposited. Therefore, SDL was dis-
appeared. But TL was still there. As shown in Fig. 1(c), the matrix
and TL were formed alternately. In Fig. 1(d), the pore diameter
was ~10 mm in TL. Compared with the pore diameter in sample
1, that reduced significantly in sample 2. For grains near porosity,
the compressed deformation occurred due to UPT. The inner sur-
faces of porosity were squeezed by these grains, which led to a
decrease of the diameter.
3.2. Microstructure of Al alloy
As shown in Fig. 2(a), the microstructure of Al component was
dendritic grain in sample 1. The distribution of dendritic grains
was uniform. According to the results in Table 1, the microstruc-
tures of points 1 and 2 were a-Al and Al-Si eutectic structure,
respectively.
In Fig. 2(b), in sample 2, the microstructure of Al component
was divided into three areas, which included TL area, dendritic
grain area and equiaxed grain area. In the (n)th layer, SDL was
remelted and TL area was the top during depositing the (n + 1)th
layer. In TL, due to UPT, the grain deformation occurred. The direc-
tion of grains in TL was same due to the effect of external force.
Besides, the grains were refined obviously. The bottom of the
(n + 1)th layer formed the fine equiaxed grains. The scope of
equiaxed grain area was ~800 mm. As shown in Fig. 2(b), according
to the results of points 3 and 4 in Table 1, the microstructures of
the dark phase and the white phase were a-Al and Al-Si eutectic
structure, respectively. It was obvious that a-Al was encompassed
by Al-Si eutectic structure. After UPT of the (n)th layer Al alloy, the
Al-Si eutectic structure with the continuous morphology was
2
Materials Letters 284 (2021) 128917
formed at the (n + 1)th layer. Compared with the Al-Si eutectic
structure in sample 1, the continuity of Al-Si eutectic structure
increased in sample 2. According to the reference [10,11], the com-
plete and incomplete wetting of grain boundaries were formed by
a continuous or discontinuous second phase, respectively. A second
phase could lead to a transition from incomplete to complete wet-
ting of Al/Al grain boundaries [12,13]. Therefore, during deposition
process of the (n + 1)th layer, the complete wetting of grain bound-
aries occurred due to Al-Si eutectic structure as a second phase.
The morphology of interpenetrating polycrystalline phases was
governed by the grain boundary wetting phase transformations,
which led to an influence on mechanical properties [14,15].
The treated surface by UPT had an influence on the grain growth
behavior of the subsequent depositing layer, leading to an
equiaxed-grain structure. The reasons are as follows: (1) After
UPT, the deformation of the (n)th layer surface occurred at SDL
and TL areas. The grains with nanocrystalline features were
formed. During depositing the (n + 1)th layer process, SDL area
was remelted. The grains grew along the orientation of deformed
grains. Due to the rapid friction heating and cooling during UPT
process with the severe plastic deformation, the grain growth ori-
entation was different from the cooling orientation. Anisotropy in
grain growth occurred, which led to the grain refinement at the
bottom of the (n + 1)th layer [16]. (2) After UPT, at TL area, the
nucleation of new grain was priority due to the increase of grain
boundary energy. The refined grains acted as the nucleation parti-
cles. The number of nucleation particles increased, which led to the
grain refinement.
As shown in Fig. 3(a), in equiaxed grain area, the refined grains
with a diameter of 200–400 nm were formed. According to the
electron diffraction pattern in Fig. 3(b), the grains were a-Al.
Besides, the dislocation wall and dislocation tangle occurred.
Thereby, the grains of Al alloy were refined significantly by UPT
layer by layer technology.
Y. Tian, J. Shen, S. Hu et al. Materials Letters 284 (2021) 128917

Fig. 2. Microstructure of components: (a) high magnified SEM image of rectangle A in Fig. 1(a) and (b) high magnified SEM image of rectangle B in Fig. 1(c).

Table 1 (3) The refined grains with a diameter of 200–400 nm were

EDS results of selected points in Fig. 2. formed in equiaxed grain area with dislocation walls and
Position Al (at. %) Si (at. %) Possible phase dislocation tangles.
Point 1 in Fig. 2(a) 99.2 0.8 a-Al (4) The complete wetting of grain boundaries occurred due to
Point 2 in Fig. 2(a) 67.2 38.2 Al-Si eutectic structure Al-Si eutectic structure as a second phase.
Point 3 in Fig. 2(b) 99.1 0.9 a-Al
Point 4 in Fig. 2(b) 66.8 33.2 Al-Si eutectic structure
CRediT authorship contribution statement

Yinbao Tian: Formal analysis, Writing - original draft. Junqi

4. Conclusions
(1) In a component, the matrix and transition layer were formed
alternately. At transition layer, the deformation of pore
occurred and pore size reduced due to ultrasonic peening
treatment layer by layer to Al alloy layers.
(2) The microstructure distribution of component presented a
periodic distribution, which included the dendritic grain,
equiaxed grain and deformed grain. The equiaxed grains
and deformed grains were refined significantly.
Shen: Funding acquisition, Writing - review & editing. Shengsun
Hu: Supervision, Conceptualization. Jian Han: Investigation,
Methodology. Qian Wang: Resources, Methodology. Yangchuan
Cai: Investigation, Methodology.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.

Fig. 3. TEM analysis of rectangle C in Fig. 2(b): (a) TEM morphology of equiaxed grain area and (b) electron diffraction pattern of the circle in Fig. 3(a).

3
Y. Tian, J. Shen, S. Hu et al.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by National Natural Science Founda-
tion of China (Grant No. 51575381), Tianjin Research Program of
Application Foundation and Advanced Technology (Grant No.
15JCZDJC38600).
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