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At least 397 records · Page 22

Thermo-mechanical behavior of hypoeutectic Ni-Y-Zr alloys

Microstructure refinement and optimized alloying can improve metallic alloy performance: stable nanocrystalline (NC) alloys with immiscible second phases, e.g., Cu-Ta, are stronger than unstable NC alloys and their coarse-grained (CG) counterparts, but higher melting point matrices are needed. Hypoeutectic, CG Ni-Y-Zr alloys were produced via arc-melting to explore their potential as high-performance materials. Microstructures were studied to determine phases present, local composition and length scales, while heat treatments allowed investigating microstructural stability. Alloys had a stable, hierarchical microstructure with ~250 nm ultrafine eutectic, ~10 µm dendritic arm spacing and ~1 mm grain size. Hardness and uniaxial compression tests revealed that mechanical properties of Ni-0.5Y-1.8Zr (in wt%) were comparable to Inconel 617 despite the small alloying additions, due to its hierarchical microstructure. Here, uniaxial compression at 600 °C showed that ternary alloys outperformed Ni-Zr and Ni-Y binary alloys in flow stress and hardening rates, which indicates that the Ni 17 Y 2 phase was an effective reinforcement for the eutectic, which supplemented the matrix hardening due to increased solubility of Zr. Results suggest that ternary Ni-Y-Zr alloys hold significant promise for high temperature applications.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Preparation and characterization of a siloxane containing bismaleimide

A novel siloxane containing bismaleimide has been prepared by reacting maleic anhydride, benzophenonetetracarboxylic dianhydride and bis(gamma-aminopropyl)tetramethyldisiloxane. Characterization of this monomer was done by comparing its nuclear magnetic resonance spectrum (NMR) to those of model compounds. Solubility of the prepolymer was tested in amide, chlorinated and ether solvents. Films were cast from solution as well as by melt processing and a cure cycle was determined. Infrared spectrum (IR) of the resulting film was obtained. Thermal polymerization was investigated by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Thermal properties of the cured resin were followed by means of thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), torsional braid analysis (TBA) and dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA). Thermomechanical analysis (TMA) was used to study the effect of postcure on the glass transition temperature (Tg) of the resin. Adhesive strength of the resin was obtained at ambient temperature.

Maudgal, S.↗

Plastic flow of plasma sprayed ceramics

The plastic flow of plasma-sprayed ZrO2-8Y2O3 ceramic has been measured at temperatures up to 1250 C and compared to the plastic flow of pressed and sintered ZrO2-8Y2O3. Plasma spraying of binary oxide ceramics is found to result in a metastable state which is inelastic at high temperature but can also be stabilized or devitrified through heat treating so as to decrease plastic properties. The mechanical properties of the as-plasma sprayed and devitrified ceramic sheet material was measured. An improved algorithm that incorporates the inherently nonlinear thermomechanical field equations was used to determine the influence of inelastic material behavior on the thermomechanical response of ceramic coated seal components. Significant creep was found during the thermal shock and steady heating periods with insufficient time during thermal quench to reverse the process, thereby inducing significant residual stresses into the components.

Padovan, J.↗

Thermomechanical Fatigue Durability of T650-35/PMR-15 Sheet-Molding Compound Evaluated

High-performance polymer matrix composites (PMC's) continue to be the focus of a number of research efforts aimed at developing cost-effective, lightweight material alternatives for advanced aerospace and aeropropulsion applications. These materials not only offer significant advantages in specific stiffness and strength over their current metal counterparts, but they can be designed and manufactured to eliminate joints and fasteners by combining individual components into integral subassemblies, thus making them extremely attractive for commercial applications. With much emphasis on the low-cost manufacturing aspects of advanced composite structures, there is heightened interest in high-performance sheet-molding compounds (SMC's). Researchers at the NASA Lewis Research Center, in cooperation with the Allison Advanced Development Company, completed an investigation examining the use of T650-35/PMR-15 SMC for a midstage inner-vane endwall application within a gas turbine engine compressor. This component resides in the engine flow path and is subjected not only to high airflow rates, but also to elevated temperatures and pressures. This application is unique in that it represents a very aggressive use of high-performance SMC's, raising obvious concerns related to durability and property retention in the presence of microstructural damage. Therefore, it was necessary to evaluate the fatigue behavior and damage tolerance of this material subjected to a representative thermomechanical fatigue (TMF) mission-cycle loading spectrum.

Castelli, Michael G.↗

High-Fidelity Mock Development for the Insensitive High Explosive TATB

Due to the violent reaction potential of high explosives, in tests where a reaction is not desired, it can be safe and convenient to use an inert mock that can mimic relevant properties of the associated explosive. Use of mock materials is well-established in explosives work, but most existing mocks are generally meant to mimic only one or two properties of a given explosive, potentially failing to match the explosive in other critical ways. Recently, there has been interest in developing robust thermomechanical mocks for many common explosives. Here, eleven materials are systematically chosen and investigated as potential thermomechanical mocks for TATB, the explosive component of PBX 9502. DSC, nanoindentation, and compression testing are used to narrow down to most appropriate mocks and identify their advantages and limitations. Hardness and elastic modulus are reported for the first time for the molecular crystals iodoanthranilic acid, hexamine, melamine, and trithiolane dioxide, and the crystal structure is reported for the first time for the molecular crystals iodoanthranilic acid and iodosalicylic acid.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Predicting Lifetime of a Thermomechanically Loaded Component

NASALIFE is a computer program for predicting the lifetime, as affected by low cycle fatigue (LCF) and creep rupture, of a structural component subject to temporally varying, multiaxial thermomechanical loads. The component could be, for example, part of an aircraft turbine engine. Empirical data from LCF tests, creep rupture tests, and static tensile tests are used as references for predicting the number of missions the component can withstand under a given thermomechanical loading condition. The user prepares an input file containing the creep-rupture and cyclic-fatigue information, temperature-dependent material properties, and mission loading and control flags. The creep rupture information can be entered in tabular form as stress versus life or by means of parameters of the Larson-Miller equation. The program uses the Walker mean-stress model to adjust predicted life for ranges of the ratio between the maximum and minimum stresses. Data representing complex load cycles are reduced by the rainflow counting method. Miner's rule is utilized to combine the damage at different load levels. Finally, the program determines the total damage due to creep and combines it with the fatigue damage due to the cyclic loading and predicts the approximate number of missions a component can endure before failing.

Murthy, Pappu L. N.↗

1300 K compressive properties of a reaction milled NiAl-AlN composites

When B2 crystal-structure nickel aluminide is subjected to high-intensity mechanical ball milling in a liquid nitrogen bath, or 'cryomilling', an NiAl composite is obtained which contains about 10 vol pct AlN particles. This composition arises from the incorporation of N during cryomilling; during subsequent thermomechanical processing, the N reacts with Al. While compressive testing of extruded or isostatically pressed specimens at 1300 K indicated that strength at relatively fast strain rates is slightly dependent on consolidation method, slower strain rates indicate no clear dependency on densification technique: four different consolidation methods were found to yield similar creep strengths. The creep properties of NiAl-AlN are similar to those of the single-crystal Ni-base superalloy NASAIR 100.

Whittenberger, J. Daniel↗

Micromechanical combined stress analysis: MICSTRAN, a user manual

Composite materials are currently being used in aerospace and other applications. The ability to tailor the composite properties by the appropriate selection of its constituents, the fiber and matrix, is a major advantage of composite materials. The Micromechanical Combined Stress Analysis (MICSTRAN) code provides the materials engineer with a user-friendly personal computer (PC) based tool to calculate overall composite properties given the constituent fiber and matrix properties. To assess the ability of the composite to carry structural loads, the materials engineer also needs to calculate the internal stresses in the composite material. MICSTRAN is a simple tool to calculate such internal stresses with a composite ply under combined thermomechanical loading. It assumes that the fibers have a circular cross-section and are arranged either in a repeating square or diamond array pattern within a ply. It uses a classical elasticity solution technique that has been demonstrated to calculate accurate stress results. Input to the program consists of transversely isotropic fiber properties and isotropic matrix properties such as moduli, Poisson's ratios, coefficients of thermal expansion, and volume fraction. Output consists of overall thermoelastic constants and stresses. Stresses can be computed under the combined action of thermal, transverse, longitudinal, transverse shear, and longitudinal shear loadings. Stress output can be requested along the fiber-matrix interface, the model boundaries, circular arcs, or at user-specified points located anywhere in the model. The MICSTRAN program is Windows compatible and takes advantage of the Microsoft Windows graphical user interface which facilitates multitasking and extends memory access far beyond the limits imposed by the DOS operating system.

Naik, R. A.↗

Fundamental Investigations into the Properties and Performance of Advanced Materials

Intelligent engineering designs require an accurate understanding of material behavior, since any uncertainties or gaps in knowledge must be counterbalanced with heightened factors of safety, leading to overdesign. Therefore, building better structures and pushing the performance of new components requires an improved understanding of the thermomechanical response of advanced materials under service conditions. This dissertation provides fundamental investigations of several advanced materials: thermoset polymers, a common matrix material for fiber-reinforced composites and nanocomposites; aluminum alloy 7075-T6 (AA7075-T6), a high-performance aerospace material; and ceramic matrix composites (CMCs), an advanced composite for extreme-temperature applications. To understand matrix interactions with various interfaces and nanoinclusions at their fundamental scale, the properties of thermoset polymers are studied at the atomistic scale. An improved proximity-based molecular dynamics (MD) technique for modeling the crosslinking of thermoset polymers is carefully established, enabling realistic curing simulations through its ability to dynamically and probabilistically perform complex topology transformations. The proximity-based MD curing methodology is then used to explore damage initiation and the local anisotropic evolution of mechanical properties in thermoset polymers under uniaxial tension with an emphasis on changes in stiffness through a series of tensile loading, unloading, and reloading experiments. Aluminum alloys in aerospace applications often require a fatigue life of over 109 cycles, which is well over ii the number of cycles that can be practically tested using conventional fatigue testing equipment. In order to study these high-life regimes, a detailed ultrasonic cycle fatigue study is presented for AA7075-T6 under fully reversed tension-compression loading. The geometric sensitivity, frequency effects, size effects, surface roughness effects, and the corresponding failure mechanisms for ultrasonic fatigue across different fatigue regimes are investigated. Finally, because CMCs are utilized in extreme environments, oxidation plays an important role in their degradation. A multiphysics modeling methodology is thus developed to address the complex coupling between oxidation, mechanical stress, and oxygen diffusion in heterogeneous carbon fiber-reinforced CMC microstructures.

Schichtel, Jacob J.↗

Effects of cobalt on the hot workability of nickel-base superalloys

The effect of cobalt on the workability of nickel-base superalloys is examined with reference to experimental results for four heats of alloys based on the Nimonic 115 composition with varying amounts of nickel substituted for the nominal 14 percent cobalt. It is shown that Co lowers the gamma-prime solvus, which in turn lowers the Cr23C6 carbide solvus. It is further shown that these solvus temperatures bracket the hot working range for the alloys. However, thermomechanical processing modifications reflecting the effect of Co on the gamma-prime and carbide solvi are shown to restore the workability and the properties of alloys with little or no cobalt.

Jarrett, R. N.↗

Temperature Dependence of Electrical Resistance of Woven Melt-Infiltrated SiCf/SiC Ceramic Matrix Composites

Recent studies have successfully shown the use of electrical resistance (ER)measurements to monitor room temperature damage accumulation in SiC fiber reinforced SiC matrix composites (SiCf/SiC) Ceramic Matrix Composites (CMCs). In order to determine the feasibility of resistance monitoring at elevated temperatures, the present work investigates the temperature dependent electrical response of various MI (Melt Infiltrated)-CVI (Chemical Vapor Infiltrated) SiC/SiC composites containing Hi-Nicalon Type S, Tyranno ZMI and SA reinforcing fibers. Test were conducted using a commercially available isothermal testing apparatus as well as a novel, laser-based heating approach developed to more accurately simulate thermomechanical testing of CMCs. Secondly, a post-test inspection technique is demonstrated to show the effect of high-temperature exposure on electrical properties. Analysis was performed to determine the respective contribution of the fiber and matrix to the overall composite conductivity at elevated temperatures. It was concluded that because the silicon-rich matrix material dominates the electrical response at high temperature, ER monitoring would continue to be a feasible method for monitoring stress dependent matrix cracking of melt-infiltrated SiC/SiC composites under high temperature mechanical testing conditions. Finally, the effect of thermal gradients generated during localized heating of tensile coupons on overall electrical response of the composite is determined.

Ceramic Matrix Composites↗

Development of Methods of Characterizing Coal in Its Plastic State

Coal in its plastic state (typically 400-460 C) was examined by the isothermal Gieseler plastometry of seven selected coals of widely varying plastic properties. Kinetic models were proposed for the isothermal plastometric curves. Plastic behavior was compared with a variety of laboratory analyses and characterizations of these coals, including classical coal analysis; mineral analysis; microstructural analysis (extractable fractions, surface area measurement, and petrographic analysis); and thermal analysis (thermogravimetric analysis, thermomechanical analysis, and differential scanning calorimetry). The phenomenon of a sharp, large, poorly reproducible exotherm in the differential scanning calorimetric analysis of coking coals was examined. Several coal extrudates show mineral distribution, organic maceral composition and overall calorific value to be little affected by 800 F extrusion. Volatile matter and plastic properties are moderately reduced, and the network structure (as gauged by extractables) appears to be slightly degraded in the extrusion process.

Lloyd, W. G.↗

Thermomechanical Cleave of Polycrystalline CdTe Solar Cells and its Applications: A Review

One of the primary research challenges for cadmium telluride (CdTe) solar cells is addressing its open‐circuit voltage ( V OC ) deficit. While theoretical studies and single crystal work show V OC > 1 V is possible, devices remain stubbornly low at ≈800–900 mV. As absorber opto‐electronic properties (e.g., hole density, carrier lifetime) are improved, device modeling suggests that interfaces become limiting. Because CdTe‐based devices are typically grown in the superstrate configuration, the back interface is relatively accessible for manipulation and study, while the front interface (i.e., the heterojunction region) is buried under microns of material and inaccessible. NREL has developed a novel technique to thermomechanically cleave polycrystalline CdTe device stacks directly at the front interface, enabling characterization and controlled manipulation of this important region. Herein, recent work, primarily from NREL, will be reviewed, including considerations for achieving successful delamination; key scientific discoveries about the front interface that have been enabled by this technique; and practical applications, such as flexible, low‐cost solar with high power‐to‐weight ratio.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Stresses within rare-earth doped yttria-stabilized zirconia thermal barrier coatings from in-situ synchrotron X-ray diffraction at high temperatures

There is a growing interest for smart coatings that can be integrated into turbine engines for in-situ temperature measurements or health monitoring. The addition of rare-earth dopants into standard thermal barrier ceramic top coat materials is used to obtain luminescent coatings that enable spectral measurements, for real-time temperature or health monitoring. The thermomechanical performance and durability of such novel coating compositions in extreme environments still remains to be evaluated. Consequently, the ability to manufacture sensor coatings which present suitable thermal properties needs to be demonstrated. For this study, highly luminescent erbium and europium doped yttria-stabilized zirconia and state-of-the-art yttria-stabilized zirconia coatings manufactured by air plasma spray were characterized to determine the effects of the embedded rareearth dopants on coating internal strain and stress and to quantify and compare their high temperature response using synchrotron X-ray diffraction. In-situ depth-resolved strain measurements were performed at 15 μm intervals along the depth of the coatings to evaluate materials response at key locations, specifically at layer interfaces. In-plane stress was calculated for the coatings and a finite element model was implemented to supplement the results and enable further predictions. The results show that the sensor coatings that were manufactured in this work revealed only minor variations in the strain response of sensor coatings under a typical thermal cycle and especially at temperatures closer to that of gas turbine operating conditions, compared to state-of-the-art coatings. This work demonstrates the viability of manufacturing rare-earth doped yttria-stabilized zirconia coatings that provide beneficial spectroscopic monitoring capabilities while having minimal impact on the thermomechanical response of the thermal barrier coatings.

Air plasma spray↗

Recrystallization and superplasticity at 300 C in an aluminum-magnesium alloy

Variations in thermomechanical processing (TMP) which regulate the microstructural characteristics and superplastic response of an Al-10Mg-0.1Zr alloy at 300 C were evaluated. Mechanical property data revealed that the superplastic ductility can be enhanced by simultaneously increasing the total rolling strain, the reduction per pass, and the duration of reheating intervals between passes during isothermal rolling. Texture and microscopy data were consistent with the development of a refined microstructure by recovery-dominated processes, i.e., continuous recrystallization, during the processing. The mechanisms by which a refined substructure can be progressively converted into a fine-grained structure during repeated cycles of deformation and annealing are addressed. A qualitative description of the complex sequence of developments leading to a microstructure better suited to support superplastic response is presented.

Hales, S. J.↗

Powder-metallurgy superalloy strengthened by a secondary gamma phase.

Description of experiments in which prealloyed powders of superalloy compositions were consolidated by extrusion after the strengthening by precipitation of a body-centered tetragonal gamma secondary Ni3 Ta phase. Thin foil electron microscopy showed that the mechanical properties of the resultant powder-metallurgy product were correlated with its microstructure. The product exhibited high strength at 1200 F without loss of ductility, after thermomechanical treatment and aging.

Kotval, P. S.↗

Film mounting method for thermomechanical analysis

Mounting clamps attach polymeric film sample to thermomechanical analyzer. Using this technique, temperature at which polymer passes from relatively nonflexible or glasslike state to rubbery condition where it exhibits marked increase in flow properties is readily determined.

Burks, H. D.↗

Simplified method for nonlinear structural analysis

A simplified inelastic analysis computer program was developed for predicting the stress-strain history of a thermomechanically cycled structure from an elastic solution. The program uses an iterative and incremental procedure to estimate the plastic strains from the material stress-strain properties and a simulated plasticity hardening model. The simplified method was exercised on a number of problems involving uniaxial and multiaxial loading, isothermal and nonisothermal conditions, and different materials and plasticity models. Good agreement was found between these analytical results and nonlinear finite element solutions for these problems. The simplified analysis program used less than 1 percent of the CPU time required for a nonlinear finite element analysis.

Kaufman, A.↗