Background and Objective: Nickel-base superalloys, strengthened by a high volume fraction of Ni3Al precipitates, have been the undisputed choice for turbine discs in gas turbines as they exhibit the best available combination of elevated temperature tensile strength and resistance to low cycle fatigue (LCF), which are essential for a disc alloy. Alloy 720LI is a wrought nickel-base superalloy developed for disc application and exhibit superior elevated temperature tensile strength and LCF properties. It is distinct from contemporary disc alloys because of its chemistry, (especially Ti, Al and interstitial (C and B) contents), processing and heat treatment. However, literature available in open domain to develop an understanding of these properties in alloy 720LI is rather limited. This study was taken up in this background with an objective of assessing the tensile and LCF properties exhibited by alloy 720LI within a temperature regime of interest and understand the structure-property correlations behind it. Tensile Behavior: The effect of temperature and strain rate on monotonic tensile properties were assessed at different temperature in the range of 25 – 750°C (0.67 Tm) at a strain rate of 10-4 s-1 and strain rate effects were explored in detail at 25, 400, 650 and 750°C at different strain rates between 10-5 s-1 and 10-1 s-1. Yield and ultimate tensile strength of the alloy remains unaffected by temperature till about 600°C (0.58Tm) and 500°C (0.51Tm), respectively, beyond which both decreased drastically. Negligible strain rate sensitivity exhibited by the alloy at 25 and 400°C indicated that flow stress is a strong function of strain hardening rather than strain rate hardening. However at 650 and 750°C, especially at low strain rates, strain rate sensitivity is relatively high. TEM studies revealed that heterogeneous planar slip involving shearing of precipitates by dislocation pairs was prevalent under strain rate insensitive conditions and more homogeneous slip was evident when flow stresses were strain rate sensitive. The planarity of slip is also considered responsible for the deviation in experimental data from the Ludwick–Hollomon power-law at low plastic strains in regimes insensitive to strain rate. Irrespective of strain rate sensitivity and degree of homogeneity of slip, fracture mode remained ductile at almost all the conditions studied. Dynamic Strain Ageing: Alloy 720LI exhibits jerky flow in monotonic tension at intermediate temperatures ranging from 250-475°C. After considering all known causes for serrated flow in materials, the instability in flow (Portevin-LeChatelier (PLC) effect) is considered attributable to dynamic strain ageing (DSA), arising from interactions between diffusing solute atoms and mobile dislocations during plastic flow. As the temperature range of DSA coincided with typical bore and web temperatures of turbine discs, its possible influence on tensile properties is considered in detail. No significant change in tensile strength, ductility, or work hardening is observed, due to DSA, with increase in temperature from smooth to serrated flow regime. However strain rate sensitivity, which is positive in smooth flow regime turned negative in the serrated flow regime. Analysis of serrated flow on the basis of critical plastic strain for onset of serrations revealed that in most of the temperature-strain rate regimes studied, alloy 720LI exhibits ‘inverse’ PLC effect which is a phenomenon that has not been fully understood in contrast to ‘normal’ PLC effect observed widely in dilute solid solutions. Other characteristics of serrated flow viz., stress decrement and strain increment between serrations are also analyzed to understand the mechanism of DSA. Though the activation energy determined using stress decrements suggest that carbon atoms could be responsible for locking of dislocations, based on its influence on mechanical properties and also on its temperature regime of existence, weak pinning of dislocations by substitutional solute atoms are considered responsible for DSA in alloy 720LI. LCF Behavior: LCF studies were carried out under fully reversed constant strain amplitude conditions at 25, 400 and 650°C with strain amplitudes ranging from 0.4-1.2%. Different cyclic stress responses observed depending on the imposed conditions are correlated to the substructures that evolved. Low level of dislocation activity and interactions observed in TEM is considered the reason behind stable cyclic stress response at low strain amplitudes at all temperatures. TEM studies also show that secondary γ’ precipitates that are degraded through repeated shearing are responsible for the continuous softening, observed after a short initial hardening phase, at higher strain amplitudes. Studies at 400°C show manifestation of DSA on LCF behavior at 400°C in the form increased cyclic hardening which tends to offset softening effects at higher strain amplitudes. Plastic strain dependence of fatigue lives exhibited bilinearity in Coffin-Manson plots at all temperatures. TEM substructures revealed that planar slip with deformation concentrated on slip bands is the major deformation mode under all the conditions examined. However, homogeneity of deformation increases with increase in strain and temperature. At 25°C, with increasing strain, increased homogeneity manifested in the form of increased number of slip bands. At 650°C, with increase in strain, increased dislocation activity in the inter-slip band regions lead to increased homogeneity. It is also seen that fine deformation twins that form at 650°C and low strain amplitudes play a role in aiding homogenization of deformation. Unlike other alloy systems where an environmental effect or a change in deformation mechanism leads to bilinearity in Coffin – Manson (CM) plots, our study shows that differences in distribution of slip is the reason behind bilinear CM plots. While the properties and behavior of alloy 720LI under monotonic and cyclic loading conditions over a range of temperatures could be rationalized on the basis of deformation substructures, the thesis opens up the door for further in-depth studies on deformation mechanisms in 720LI as well as other disc alloys of similar microstructure.

Aim of the present work was to explore the possibility of improving strength of cast Mg by alloying additions, viz., Si and Zn+Al. All the alloys were produced by squeeze casting technique using squeeze pressure of 12MPa and their microstructure, tensile and corrosion properties were studied. Mg-Si system was chosen because the intermetallic compound Mg2Si possesses many desirable properties, such as, low density, high hardness, high melting point. Hence, there is scope for improving the strength of Mg by dispersion of primary Mg2Si particles. Addition of Si to Mg resulted in the formation of �-Mg, particles of primary Mg2Si and eutectic as microstructural constituents. The morphology of primary Mg2Si changed from polyhedral shaped particles to dendrites as Si content was increased from 3.57 to 5.5 wt%. Volume fraction of primary Mg2Si increased with increase in Si content. Particle size of primary Mg2Si also increased with increase in silicon content but at the same time it was found to be dependent on melt temperature, i.e., a lower particle size was obtained at higher melt temperatures. Addition of Al and Sr was made to Mg-2Si alloy in order to further increase the strength by solid solution strengthening and refinement/modification of primary Mg2Si particles/eutectic. Addition of 1.2 wt% Al to Mg-2Si alloy resulted in irregular type of morphology of Mg2Si particles and increased particle size. Addition of 0.2 wt% SrtoMg-2Si-1.2Al alloy resulted in slight refinement of primary Mg2Si particles and modification of eutectic. Addition of 0.4 wt% Sr resulted in both refinement and restoration of morphology of Mg2Si particles from irregular to polyhedral shape. This was accompanied by destruction of eutectic, and rods containing Mg, Si, Al and Sr were observed. The addition of 1.33 wt%Si to Mg resulted in improvement in 0.2%PS by about 80 MPa,UTS by about 40MPa and these values did not change much till the addition of 3.57 wt% Si. A drop in the strength values was observed at Si content of 5.5 wt%,where transition in morphology of primary Mg2Si occurred from polyhedral to dendrite. Addition of Si resulted in reduction in % elongation by about 2%. The addition of Al and Sr did not change the tensile properties of binary Mg-2Si alloy much. It was concluded that the volume fraction and size of primary Mg2Siparticles obtained with Si addition up to 3.57 wt% did not contribute much to strength and the strengthening mainly came from the eutectic present in the matrix. As Si content was increased to 5.5 wt% in order to increase the volume fraction of primary Mg2Si particles, the morphology of Mg2Si changed to dendritic type resulting in reduction in strength. Thus, the maximum increase in strength is achieved at near eutectic composition,i.e.,intheMg-1.33Sialloy,andfurtherincreaseinstrengthdoesnotseem to be feasible with this alloy system. The ductility of all the Mg-Si based alloys was also low, i.e, 0.5% elongation to fracture or less. Regarding the corrosion behaviour, the addition of Si to Mg deteriorated the corrosion resistance and the addition of Al and Sr further worsened it. Since further improvement in tensile properties did not seem feasible with Mg-Si alloy system, the focus was shifted to Mg-Zn-Al alloy system. There is scope for improvement in strength in Mg-Zn-Al alloy system by solid solution strengthening, grain refinement and precipitation hardening. It was observed that the addition of Zn and Al resulted in microstructure containing α-Mg grains and secondary phase at the grain boundary. XRD analysis showed the secondary phase to be Al5Mg11Zn4 but EDS analysis did not match with this composition. Therefore, the nature of this phase remains uncertain. Addition of 6 wt% Zn and 1 wt% Al resulted in improvement in strength as well as ductility: 0.2%PS improved by about 70 MPa, UTS by about 100 MPa and % elongation by about 7%. Addition of small amounts of Caresultedinrefinementofmicrostructurecausingimprovementinstrengthwithout much decrease in % elongation. Increase in Al content from 1 to 4 wt% resulted in increase in 0.2%PS but UTS slightly decreased, as % elongation reduced. Alloys subjected to T6 heat treatment showed improvement in strength but slight reduction in % elongation. ZA64 alloy in T6 condition gave 130 MPa 0.2%PS, 225 MPa UTS and 4.9% elongation, which are much higher tensile properties as compared Mg-Si alloys. All the three mechanisms mentioned above contribute to the strengthening. There is scope for further improvement in strength by employing a more suitable heat treatment. Regarding corrosion behaviour, addition of 6 wt% Zn and 1 wt% of Al to Mg did not deteriorate its corrosion resistance much. Addition of small amounts of Ca was found to be beneficial for corrosion resistance, whereas an increase in Al content lowered the corrosion resistance. Heat treatment also reduced the corrosion resistance.