2002 年 42 巻 8 号 p. 882-888
Microstructure of C-free martensitic alloys at elevated temperatures was studied for understanding the origin of their superior creep properties over 923 K. These alloys initially have martensitic structure and the heterogeneous creep deformation seems to be suppressed even under low stress region in distinction from the conventional heat resisting steels because there is no rapid growth of carbides during creep at high temperatures.
Inter-metallic compounds such as Laves or μ phase were dominantly observed over 923 K and these precipitation had been followed by the low temperature reaction that greatly contributed to the typical aging behavior like in the usual maraging steels. It was found that the density of the precipitation was still kept high even at 973 K because its gathering and coalescence rate was small comparing with that of high Cr steels. Furthermore, the reversely transformed austenite phase certainly appeared by the shearing mechanism in these alloys when the materials were rapidly heated up to the temperature for creep testing, because their As points were measured to be at around 873 K. This austenite phase represented terrace like feature in SEM observations. Fortunately, this characteristic structure was resulted from a selective electropolishing in specimen preparation due to the compositional fluctuation. However, it was also confirmed that partitioning of alloying element was not completed in the short-term aged materials.
It was concluded that the characteristic microstructure of these alloys over 923 K was continuously formed as follows. Firstly, uniform fine precipitation of inter-metallic compounds occurred at early stage and then the reversely transformed austenite was broken out without diffusion process. Finally, dissolution of precipitation in the retained martensitic region was assisted by long-term keeping at high temperatures. Consequently, it was expected that specific creep resistance of these alloys over 923 K be achieved by existence of large amount of austenitic phase strengthened by fine precipitation.
