Characterization of spark plasma sintered TiN nanoparticle strengthened titanium alloy using EBSD and TKD

Spark plasma sintering is one of the best fabrication techniques for producing products with little grain growth and control of microstructures. Ti6Al4V alloy strengthened with 4 vol.% TiN was produced by spark plasma sintering method. In this study, the influence of nanoparticle ceramic addition, dispersion behaviour and interfaces reaction existence on the sintered titanium matrix composite were investigated. The microstructural characterization of the sintered composite was analyzed using scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) with an attachment of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD), transmission Kikuchi diffraction (TKD) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) technique for phases identification. The results show that TiN nanoparticle was evenly dispersed in the sintered composite which resulted in the formation of grains with changes in crystallographic orientations after the addition of nanoparticle material. Moreover, the TKD attempt has been made to reveal TiN interface sub-grains structures formed at the grain boundary during the process of spark plasma sintering.