| Abstract Scope |
The additive manufacturing process promises to provide new and highly customized processing methods for metal alloy components. Due to the large thermal gradients and resultant residual stresses built up in the printing process, the grain morphologies and structures are far from the typical alloy microstructures. In this presentation, we will examine the orientation gradients present in additively manufactured 316L, as measured by automated mechanical serial-sectioning with electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD) maps, with a data set that encompasses over 30,000 grains. We will show that while the grain sizes can have a very wide distribution, with the largest grains reaching over millimeters in length, the local orientation gradients within those grains lead to grain-spread distributions of over 20°. We will also discuss proper metrics for analyzing these gradients by normalizing for the local grain size within the structure. |