A Fully Kinetic Phase Diagram-Coupled Multicomponent Columnar-to-equiaxed Grain Transition Model with an Application to Additive Manufacturing

The columnar-to-equiaxed transition (CET) is known to impact crack formation during the additive manufacturing of metallic alloys. While previous experiments have shown that CET is tunable via its alloying elements, a rigorous multicomponent model to demonstrate the impact of multi-alloying components on CET is still lacking. In this study, we developed a multicomponent model by fully coupling the phase diagram of the kinetic interface condition. Building upon the binary model reported by Gaumann et al. our model replaces the restrictive approach of calculating the non-equilibrium partition coefficient and liquidus slopes with kinetic phase diagram calculation. The extended multicomponent model was validated by comparing it with the Al–Cu results reported by Gaumann et al. CET transition curves were computed for two Al–Cu–Mg–Si–Zn alloys manufactured using laser powder bed fusion. The results are in qualitative agreement with our own and previously reported experimental results. These findings suggest that the proposed multicomponent CET model is a valuable tool for designing AM alloys and optimising processing parameters.