Effect of thermocycling on the temperatures of phase transformations, structure, and properties of the equiatomic alloy Ti50.0Ni50.0

Abstract

This article is devoted to studying the influence of thermocycling in the range of temperatures of the thermoelastic martensitic transformation B2–B19' on the microstructure, the temperatures of the martensitic transformations, and the mechanical properties of the equiatomic alloy Ti₅₀Ni₅₀ in the coarse-grained (CG) and ultrafine-grained (UFG) states, the latter obtained by equal-channel angular pressing (ECAP). One hundred cycles of thermocycling and the related increase in the dislocation density in the CG alloy led to a decrease in the temperatures of martensitic transformations. In the UFG alloy, the temperatures of the forward transformation (M_s, M_f) decrease by 2–3 K, and the temperatures of the reverse transformation (A_s, A_f) increase by 6 K. The ultimate strength remains almost unaltered upon the thermocycling, but the yield stress increases substantially from 430 to 550 MPa and from 935 to 1120 MPa for the CG and UFG states, respectively.