Grain Boundary Engineering and Its Effect on Intergranular Corrosion Resistance of a Ni-Cr-Mo Based C276 Superalloy

A Ni-Cr-Mo-based C276 superalloy was cold rolled to 5-40% and annealed at 1050 degrees C for 30 min. The microstructure and grain boundary character distribution after cold rolling and annealing were characterized. Grain refinement and a certain amount of coincident-site lattice (CSL) boundaries were obtained through recrystallization. The fraction of CSL boundaries reached peak at the cold rolling of 15% and annealing at 1050 degrees C for 30 min, which was the critical condition for completed recrystallization. In addition, sensitization treatments and double-loop electrochemical potentiokinetic reaction (DL-EPR) tests were applied to the cold rolled and annealed samples. The samples with a high fraction of CSL boundaries showed higher intergranular corrosion resistance as compared to the ones with a low fraction of CSL boundaries. It implies that the intergranular corrosion resistance of C276 superalloy can be enhanced by optimizing the grain boundary structure through cold rolling and annealing.