Quantitative analysis of inclusions in high-strength steels by x-ray computed tomography using ultra-bright synchrotron radiation

The observation of internal microstructures in materials is important to elucidate the mechanisms of ultra-long life fatigue of high-strength steels, and to ensure the integrity of structures. By conventional techniques, such as laboratory X-ray and ultrasonic imaging, the size and shape of subsurface non-metallic inclusions and cracks, those are smaller than 100 μm, cannot be measured. Then, in the present study, the ultra-bright synchrotron radiation X-ray was applied to the imaging of subsurface inclusion. To obtain basic data for the measurement, the penetration depth of synchrotron radiation wave in a free-cutting steel was examined. It was found that the depths where the transmitted wave cannot be observed are 100 μm for 15 keV, 200 μm for 20 keV, 600 μm for 25 keV, and 800 μm for 30 keV. For the measurement of size and shape of inclusion, synchrotron radiation computed tomography method (SR-CT) was employed. Metallographic structures can be observed in a free-cutting steel, and the diameter of these structures is about 7 - 10 μm. They are considered to be inclusions, which mainly contain manganese sulfide (MnS) or pearlitic phase. To investigate the possibility of detection of pearlitic phase, SR-CT was applied to observe the metallographic structures in carbon steel (S35C), which contains a lot of pearlitic phase and a little inclusion. In this case, no metallographic structure was observed inside specimen. These results indicate that the microstructures those were observed by SR-CT method was inclusions, not pearlitic phase. (author)