Open Access

High- and medium-entropy alloys (HEAs) are a quite new class of materials. They have a high potential for applications from low to high temperatures due to the excellent combination of their structural properties. Concerning their application as components; processing properties, such as machinability, have hardly been investigated so far. Hence, machinability analyses with a focus on the influence of the milling process and its basic parameters (cutting speed, feed per cutting edge) on the resulting surface integrity of specimens from an equiatomic high- (CoCrFeMnNi) and a medium- (CoCrNi) entropy alloy have been carried out. A highly innovative milling process with ultrasonic assistance (USAM) was compared to conventional milling processes. Recent studies have shown that USAM has a high potential to significantly reduce the mechanical load on the tool and workpiece surface during milling. In this study, the basic machining and ultrasonic parameters were systematically varied. After machining, the surface integrity of the alloys was analyzed in terms of topography, defects, subsurface damage, and residual stresses. It was observed that USAM reduces the cutting forces and increases the surface integrity in terms of lower tensile residual stresses and defect density near the surfaces for the CoCrFeMnNi alloy. It was shown that the cutting forces and the metallurgical influence in the sub surface region are reduced by increasing the cutting speed and reducing the feed rate per cutting edge. With the CoCrNi alloy, the tool revealed severe wear. As a result, for this alloy no influence of the parameters on the machinability could be determined.

The crystallographic orientation of carlsbergite (CrN) in the north Chile meteorite (hexahedrite) was investigated using electron backscatter diffraction and transmission electron microscopy. These studies examined the CrN crystals in the rhabdites (idiomorphic schreibersite) and in kamacite. It was found that the CrN crystals embedded in rhabdite show a number of different orientation relationships with the host crystals. These orientations can be explained based on the lattice dimensions of both coexisting crystalline materials. It was also found that both carlsbergite and kamacite are characterized by a high dislocation density (109 cm–2) while rhabdite is free of dislocations. It is supposed that in spite of the deformed metallic matrix, a general connection between the orientation relation of all the phases involved exists.

The existing gap in the adequate prediction of the microstructure-property relationships remains a significant barrier to the safe application of the additively manufactured materials. This challenge is fundamentally tied to the intricate microstructural defects that emerge during the processing. Systematic microstructure-based modelling can offer solutions to address this bottleneck. In this work, we utilize a crystal plasticity model, developed for gamma''-strengthened Ni-base alloys and calibrated with single crystal tensile and creep tests of Inconel 718. By systematically refining the representative volume element complexity---from equiaxed to elongated grain morphologies, and from unimodal to bimodal orientation and grain size distributions---we demonstrate how each layer of structural realism contributes to the model’s predictive capacity. Creep tests of laser-based powder bed fusion (PBF-LB/M) manufactured samples in three orientations (with the tensile axis parallel, perpendicular, and 45° tilted relative to the building direction) were performed at 650° C, accompanied by electron backscatter secondary diffraction measurements. The results of our simulations reveal that the bimodal grain morphology and crystallographical texture significantly influence the observed creep anisotropy. We show that the elongated grain structure combined with grain boundary sliding plays a major role in the creep response, specifically in tilted specimens.