Usually the Sintering of Duplex Stainless Steels SS (Fe-Cr-Ni alloy) from prebounded powders of duplex stainless steels or a balance mixture between austenitic and ferritic powders are used to form a duplex microstructure. The objective of this work was to investigate the possibility of developing an alternative route to produce Duplex SS in a rather low cost, and, in addition, to evaluate the microstructural and mechanical characteristics of the Fe-22,5Cr-5,5Ni alloy. In this context, it was pursued the development of an alloy by the mixing of elementary powders with similar formulation of the duplex SS UNS S32205, in order to eliminate the need of obtaining prebounded powders. The powders were characterized by X-ray Diffraction (XRD) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) to be used in the production of 10 (ten) uniaxial tablet shaped mixtures of 18,88 mm of diameter and thermally treated varying times between 1 (one) to 6 (six) hours; isotherms from 1000ºC (1273K/1832ºF); 1100ºC (1373K/2012ºF) and 1200ºC (1473K/2192ºF) and under nitrogen controlled atmosphere. Optical Microscopy (OM) allow one to selected 4 (four) sintered mixtures to further evaluation. This study comprises the diffusion analysis of Fe, Cr and Ni elements using SEM by Energy Dispersive Spectrometer (EDS) and microstructural evaluation using (OM, SEM, XRD). The results obtained from OM and SEM analysis revealed the low diffusivity of chrome in the iron matrix. XRD spectra showed peaks of ferrite formation and austenite in some of the samples, so it was not possible to indicate the formation of a duplex structure. The Raman spectra indicated chromium oxide in the vicinity of chromium particles, preventing its spread to the ferritic matrix. Finally, the microhardness tests revealed a direct proportion to the increase of temperature and sintering time with the microhardness submitted by the mixtures obtained with elemental powders.
Mixing metal powders; Duplex Stainless Steel; Sintering of alloys Fe-Cr-Ni
