Author’s Accepted Manuscript

Reducing arc heat input and obtaining equiaxed

grains by hot-wire method during arc additive
manufacturing titanium alloy

Zixiang Li, Changmeng Liu, Tianqiu Xu, Lei Ji,

Donghai Wang, Jiping Lu, Shuyuan Ma, Hongli
Fan
www.elsevier.com/locate/msea

PII: S0921-5093(18)31539-9
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msea.2018.11.022
Reference: MSA37142
To appear in: Materials Science & Engineering A
Received date: 28 September 2018
Revised date: 2 November 2018
Accepted date: 3 November 2018
Cite this article as: Zixiang Li, Changmeng Liu, Tianqiu Xu, Lei Ji, Donghai
Wang, Jiping Lu, Shuyuan Ma and Hongli Fan, Reducing arc heat input and
obtaining equiaxed grains by hot-wire method during arc additive manufacturing
titanium alloy, Materials Science & Engineering A,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msea.2018.11.022
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 Reducing arc heat input and obtaining equiaxed
grains by hot-wire method during arc additive
manufacturing titanium alloy
Zixiang Li, Changmeng Liu*, Tianqiu Xu, Lei Ji, Donghai Wang, Jiping Lu, Shuyuan

Ma, HongliFan

School of Mechanical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, 100081,

China
*
Corresponding author, Tel.: +86 10 68915097; fax: +86 10 68915097,

liuchangmeng@bit.edu.cn

Abstract

Arc additive manufacturing technology has high deposition efficiencies and

material utilization rates. However, the large heat input and high temperature gradient

during arc additive manufacturing process lead to the formation of the coarse

columnar grains. Due to the presence of the coarse columnar grains, the mechanical

properties of the part have great anisotropy which limits the application of it. In this

experiment, a method named hot-wire arc additive manufacturing was adopted to

reduce the arc heat input and refine the columnar grains, and four thin-walled samples

with the material of Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si were manufactured. It is interesting

to find that the coarse columnar grains have been greatly refined, and finally a part

consisting of equiaxed grains and short columnar grains was obtained. At the same

time, the width of the α-lath has also been refined. The mechanical properties are in

accordance with the grain changes and the anisotropy almost disappeared. And it

seems that a part with comprehensive mechanical properties can be obtained by the

hot-wire arc additive manufacturing.

1
Keywords: Hot-wire arc additive manufacturing; Refine columnar grains;

Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si; Comprehensive mechanical properties

1. Introduction

Additive manufacturing(AM), as a net-shape forming method, is different from

traditional material reduction manufacturing process, that is based on the principle of

scatter-accumulation [1]. AM can be divided into electron beam additive

manufacturing, laser additive manufacturing, and arc additive manufacturing [2]. Arc

additive manufacturing uses wire as the main consumable which has high deposition

efficiency and material utilization rate. However, there also exist some difficulties that

limit the application of the arc additive manufacturing. Firstly, coarse grains are

caused by the large arc heat input. Secondly, large temperature gradient during the

process lead to the formation of columnar β grains. Fig.1 show the grain morphology

of the part manufactured by the traditional arc additive manufacturing and the coarse

columnar β grains were also reported in other researches [3-6]. The coarse columnar β

grain is the decisive factor for the mechanical properties of the entire part. It tends to

have good elongation rate, poor yield strength and ultimate tensile strength along the

growth direction (deposition direction). However, the horizontal direction tends to

have the opposite mechanical properties [4, 7, 8]. The coarse columnar grains are

advantageous for the parts which need unidirectional mechanical properties (such as

blades). However, for those parts that require comprehensive mechanical properties, it

can-not meet their requirements.

Some researchers have done much works to refine these coarse columnar grains.

Paul A.Colegrove obtained finer grains by means of high-pressure rolling [9]. Qianru

Wu adopted a method of increasing the cooling rate to make coarse β grains be better

refined [10]. M.J.bermingham get the narrower columnar β grains through adding the

trace boron into the molten pool [11]. These studies have refined the β grains to a

certain extent by different ways. And in this experiment, a different way named
2
hot-wire arc additive manufacturing (HWAAM) was adopted, which is a good way to

reduce arc heat input.

The fundamental principle of HWAAM is to assist the arc heat through

resistance heat. This method has been used in welding and has proven to be effective

in reducing the heat input of the arc [12]. A similar approach has also been applied in

laser additive manufacturing [13]. Therefore, in this paper, HWAAM was adopted to

verify the effect of refining the columnar grains. And four square parts with different

resistance heat assisted were manufactured. The characteristics of coarse columnar β

grains, microstructure and mechanical properties were investigated and analyzed as

well.

2. Experimental procedures

2.1 Hot-wire arc additive manufacturing

The principle of this equipment is schematically illustrated in Fig. 2 (a). Besides

the fundamental modules of the WAAM, it adds a new module which is used to

produce the resistance heat through a power source (Autai HW-200). And the positive

pole is connected to a slider which has sliding contact with the feeding wire and

negative pole is connected to the substrate. The tungsten inert gas (TIG) torch is

installed on a three axis computer numerical control (CNC) machine tool which can

move upwards and downwards. And the reason for generating resistance heat on the

wire before it inserts in the welding pool is illustrated in Fig.2 (c). When at the basic

time of the TIG power source current, the wire can-not be melted completely and it

was sent into the melting pool in unmelted state. It has a connected circuitry when the

half melting wire contact the part or substrate. And there will produce a lot of

resistance heat on the wire as a result of the high resistivity of titanium. This heat can

be assisted to melt the moving wire which will reduce heat from the arc, so fine

microstructure can be obtained with low arc heat input. And the stability of the arc

3
will be affected by the direct current, so the hot wire power resource was used to

produce the alternating current in this experiment. And the whole equipment picture is

shown in Fig. 2 (b).

2.2 Experimental set up

In order to prevent the part being oxidized during the manufacturing process, the

whole deposition procedure was carried out in an argon atmosphere with a purity of

99.99%. The diameter of the wire used in this experiment is 1.6mm, and it was

straightened by a straighter before it was sent to the melting pool. The material of the

substrate is Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si with a size of 150mm×150mm×5mm.

Before be fixed on the machine, the substrate was polished by a mechanical way for

the sake of removing the bad effect of the oxide film on it.

This paper aims to investigate whether there have fine microstructure and tensile

properties with the decreasing of the arc heat input. And the resistance heat was used

to assist the arc heat to make sure the part has good forming quality. Four groups of

tests (H-0, H-60, H-80, H-100) were set with the optimized parameters based on the

basic research before, and the parameters are listed in Table 1.The value of the arc

heat input was calculated through the Eq. (1) and Eq. (2)[14].
𝐼𝑝 𝑡𝑝 +𝐼𝑏 𝑡𝑏
𝐼𝑎𝑣 (𝐴) = (1)
𝑡𝑝 +𝑡𝑏

𝐽 𝑉𝑎𝑣
Hi (𝑚𝑚) = η𝐼𝑎𝑣 (2)
𝑇𝑆

Where Iav is the average current of the TIG welding, Ip is the peak current and Ib is the

base current, tp is the peak time and tb is the base current duration. And Hi is the arc

heat input, η is arc efficiency (assumed to be 0.83), Vav is the average voltage of the

TIG welding, TS is the travel speed of the welding torch. With the arc heat input

decreasing, the hot-wire current increase to ensure the normal melting of the wire.

And in each group a thin-walled square component (50 layers high, 50mm long and

50mm broad) was manufactured.

4
 This experiment uses material of Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si (named TC11 in

China and BT9 in Russia). And the actual chemical composition used in this

experiment is shown in Table 2. It is a typical α+β type titanium alloy with excellent

comprehensive mechanical properties at room temperature. what is more, it also have

high temperature strength and well creep resistance under 500℃. Therefore, it is

widely used in the aerospace industry (like engine blades, drums and large structural

parts) [15-17].

2.3 Characterization

As shown in Fig.3 (a), over three longitudinal and transverse drawing samples

were taken from the part of each group at the same position (at middle place about 10

layer to 40 layer). And it was used to test the tensile properties and the size of the

sample is indicated in Fig.3 (b). Tensile test was executed at room temperature using

an Instron 5966 electronic universal material testing machine at a strain rate of

9.8 10-4 s 1 and the fracture surface was analyzed by the BCPCAS4800 scanning

electron microscope (SEM). Metallographic specimen was treated with the standard

mechanical polishing and etched with a solution of 1ml HF, 6ml HNO 3 and 100ml H 2 O .

The take position of metallographic specimen is shown in Fig.3 (a), which through 50

layers and with the substrate on it. The microstructure was examined by Leica

DM4000M optical microscope (OM) and SEM. The width of α-lath and grain size

was quantified by Image-Pro Plus 6.0 software.

3. Results and discussion

3.1 Macrostructure

As shown in Fig.4, four thin-walled square parts were manufactured. It is

obvious that great difference exists in their appearance, which is caused by the size of

5
the molten pool. And the height of four parts changed from 40mm to 80mm and the

width of the thin-walled changed from 8.5mm to 5.5mm. From the partial

enlargement of the four components surface, periodic bulges can be seen in all

components which indicate the process of the AM steps. However, the surface of the

group H-0 is much smoother than the group H-100 that is because the layer thickness

of group H-0 is lower than H-100. Furthermore, the group H-0 and H-60 exhibit the

coarse columnar β grains on the surface which is not obvious in the group H-80 and

H-100.

The macrostructure of the etched cross sections are presented in Fig.5. H-0 and

H-60 are made up of the coarse columnar β grains which run through several layers or

whole parts and there also have the same grain morphology in other AM ways [18].

However, compared with the group H-0 and H-60, the coarse columnar grain was

slightly refined in the group H-80 that appeared some short columnar grains in the

middle of the coarse columnar grains. But in terms of the whole grain morphology,

the macrostructure of the H-80 also belongs to the columnar grains. But the width of

columnar grains from H-0 to H-80 changed from 8mm to 2mm. And different with the

H-0, H-60 and H-80, there almost do not exist coarse columnar β grains in the H-100,

whereas, it is the mixture of equiaxed grains and short columnar grains.

The arc heat input can affect the morphology of the molten pool, which means

with low arc heat input, the width of the molten pool will decrease but the height will

increase, while high arc heat input will result in decreasing in height and increasing in

width [19]. The schematic view of the cross section of the molten pool is shown in

Fig.6 (a). The basic parameters are the molten pool width and layer thickness. And the

two main factors which affect the grain growth trend during the additive

manufacturing process are temperature gradient G and solidification velocity V. High

G and low V tend to result in columnar grains, however, low G and high V will lead to

equiaxed growth [20]. And according to previous studies, the temperature gradient G

at both ends of the molten pool (low thickness) is large, and in the middle part (high

6
thickness) of the molten pool is small [21]. So it is not difficult to indicate that large

layer thickness will result in low G and small layer thickness will lead to high G. And

the arc heat input gradually reduced from H-0 to H-100, so the solidification velocity

V increased. And the cross section of the molten pool of part H-0 ~ H-100 is shown in

Fig 6(b) ~ (e). The layer thickness of it changed from 0.9mm to 1.7mm and the width

change from 8.5mm to 5.5mm. So it can be deduced that the G reduced and the V

raised from H-0 to H-100. For the reason of the small layer thickness of the H-0 and

H-60, there are high G and low V which makes the epitaxial growth always as the

dominant grain growth way. But the thickness of H-60 is a little thicker that lead to

the columnar grains was refined than H-0. The H-80 has lower G and higher V than

the H-0 and H-60, so a small amount of equiaxed grains will appear during

solidification. But the growth of columnar grains cannot be prevented because the

number of equiaxed grains is too small, so the columnar grain also as the main grain

morphology. As for the H-100, it is comprised by short columnar grains and equiaxed

grains. Because it has very high layer thickness that makes the equiaxed grains

occupying a large volume fraction among the whole molten pool which hinders the

growth of the columnar grains.

3.2 Microstructure

In order to investigate the difference in microstructure between the same parts at

different locations, the cross section of H-0 (as shown in Fig.7 (a)) is taken as an

example to study the disparity. Yanyan Zhu divided the surface of the part

manufactured by AM into stable zone and unstable zone. That is the position where

has the obvious layer bands is the stable area, on the contrary, the position do not has

the layer bands is the unstable zone [22]. In virtue of the heat input of the H-0 is very

large, so the proportion of the stable area in the whole section is relatively small.

Three points were taken from the stable zone, the unstable zone, and the interface of

the stable and unstable regions, and the microstructure diagram is shown in Fig.7 (b)

7
~ (d). All of points are shown in basket-weave microstructure, and the main reason for

this basket-weave microstructure organization is due to repeated thermal cycling

during the HWAAM process. What is more, the width of the α-lath gradually reduced

from top to bottom, and its size varies from 1.2 μm to 0.85 μm. And the reason for

this change is mainly due to the fact that the substrate is relatively cool at the

beginning, then the heat accumulation gradually increases as the additive

manufacturing process is conducted.

Owing to the width of the α-lath are not in common at different locations in one group,

so the microstructure pictures of the four groups were taken from the middle of the

parts for comparison. As shown in Fig.8 (a) ~ (d), four groups are all shown in

basket-weave microstructure, but the width of α-lath from H-0 to H-100 have the

trend to become thinner, and its width varies from 1.1 μm to 0.89 μm. According to

the previous studies, the microstructure of the additive manufacturing parts was

determined by the cooling rate of the molten pool [23]. And the cooling rate was

mainly determined by the arc heat input, generally, as the arc heat input increases, the

cooling rate of the molten pool will be slow and the microstructure of the parts is easy

to be coarse. And the increase in the resistance heat can greatly reduce the heat input

of arc and then lead to an increase in the cooling rate. As can be seen from Fig 8, with

the resistance heat increasing, the α phase has been greatly refined. And the

refinement of α phase may be helpful for improving the mechanical properties of the

additive manufacturing part[2]. Therefore, the resistance heat may has great

significance for the additive manufacturing parts.

Since the macroscopic grain morphology of H-0, H-60 and H-80 is mainly

coarse columnar grains, and H-100 are mainly composed of short columnar grains and

equiaxed grains. So the differences between the internal α phase of the different grains

are studied by the representative of H-60 and H-100. Figure.9 (a), (b) are the SEM

images of H-60 and H-100 respectively. It can be seen that the α phase of H-60 grows

from the grain boundary, and then gradually becomes a more uniform basket-weave

8
microstructure which may have a good impact on mechanical properties of TC11, and

little α phase was found at the grain boundary(GB). On the contrary, the continuous

grain boundary α (CGB) of H-100 is much larger than the intragranular α phase, the

other α phase grows out of the grain boundary which is not converted into the

basket-weave structure, but exists in the form of large α colonies, and only a very

small part of the basket-weave is observed. The main reason for the difference

between the two internal tissues is the misorientation angle of the grain boundary.

While the misorientation angle of the equiaxed grains are relatively large, which

makes the α phase nucleate from the grain boundary firstly [24]. So the microstructure

of H-0 is mainly in form of basket-weave and H-100 is α colony.

3.3 Tensile properties

According to the original research, it is known that the tensile properties of

titanium is determined by the size and morphology of columnar β grains and the

width and morphology of the α-lath [2]. Due to the complexity of thermal cycling and

the large temperature gradient in the process of WAAM, there are almost coarse

columnar β grains in the parts and similar columnar grains also existed in other

additive manufacturing ways (like the laser melting deposition) [25, 26]. And the

existence of columnar grains can lead to disparity in the coarse columnar β grains

growth direction(L direction)and the vertical direction(T direction) [27]. In this paper,

the tensile properties were tested to verify the effect of the HWAAM.

Table 3 shows the room temperature tensile properties of the four groups. Each

group contains ultimate tensile strength (UTS), yield strength (YS) and elongation

rate (EL). In addition, every value has longitudinal and transverse direction (L and T).

Over three samples were tested and the last results are averaged. It can be seen that

the H-0, H-60, H-80 have great discrepancy in the two directions about the UTS.

However, this discrepancy gradually decreases with the increasing of the hot wire

current and group H-100 are even equal, as shown in Fig.9 (a). What is more, there

9
also exist this trend about the elongation rate as indicated in Fig.9 (c). On the basis of

the Hall Petch equation [28-30], there exist the grain boundary strengthening

phenomenon on the border of two adjacent grains. The reason why there exist the

differences about the three samples is that there exist fewer grain boundaries in the L

direction, whereas, there have more in the T directions. But the sample H-100 is the

mixture of short columnar grains and equiaxed grains, so the quantity of strain

boundary in two directions are scarcely less, and it has less differences about the

tensile properties. For the yield strength, it is not so obvious like UTS and EL, but

there also exist the same trend as shown in Fig.9 (b). And the strength of the samples

manufactured by HWAAM are not improved much. The main reason is that although

the coarse columnar grains are refined, but it is still in the order of millimeters, and

has little effect on the strength improvement. However, the acquisition of equiaxed

grains can reduce the difference between the two directions and is still of great

significance for promoting the development and application of arc additive

manufacturing technology.

Fig.10 shows the SEM images about the fracture morphologies. According to the

previous research, the size of the ductile dimple represents the quality of the tensile

properties which means there will be better EL and poorer UTS when the ductile

dimple is large [30, 31]. As indicated in the Fig.10 (a), there exist large dimples, so

the UTS is low and EL is high in the L direction of H-0. And there even do not have

the ductile dimples in the Fig.10 (b), so there exist good UTS and poor EL in the T

direction. Analysis of the whole SEM pictures of the four samples can definitely

contained that in the L direction the size of dimples gradually declined and the T

direction gradually increased, which is in accordance with the change rule of tensile

properties and the width of the α-lath. Therefore through the resistance heat assisted,

an additive manufacturing part with comprehensive tensile properties can be obtained.

10
Conclusion

In this study, four thin-walled square components use the TC11 titanium alloy

were manufactured through hot-wire arc additive manufacturing (HWAAM), and the

macrostructure, microstructure and mechanical properties were investigated. The

following are the main conclusions:

1. With the hot-wire current increasing, the morphology of the samples have great

changes. The width of the thin-wall changes from 8.5mm to 5.5mm and the layer

thickness changes from 0.9mm to 1.7mm. And with the rising of layer thickness,

the periodic bulges become obvious.

2. When there is no resistance heat assisted, the parts are mainly composed of coarse

columnar β grains. But using the way of HWAAM, the size of the columnar grains

decrease sharply. And the final part with the largest heat assisted is made up of

mixture of short columnar grains and equiaxed grains.

3. The four samples all exhibit basket-weave microstructure. But with the increasing

of the hot-wire current, the width of the α-lath has the trend to be thinner (from

1.1 μm to 0.89 μm).

4. For the existence of the columnar grains, both the tensile strength and elongation

rate all showed big differences in the scanning direction and deposition direction.

However with the increasing of the resistance heat, the differences between two

directions become smaller and smaller and finally even disappeared which

indicated the feature of the equiaxed grains.

Acknowledgement

The work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation

of China (51875041, 51875042). The authors are grateful to Qianru Wu at Beijing

Institute of Technology for the language modification.

11
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and on the mechanical properties in Ti6Al4V alloy, Journal of Alloys & Compounds
329(1–2) (2001) 142-152.

14
Fig 1.Coarse columnar β grains part manufactured by the traditional arc additive

manufacturing[3]

15
Figure 2 (a) Schematic of the hot-wire arc additive manufacturing system. (b)

Overview of the hot-wire arc additive manufacturing system. (c) Schematic principle

to procedure the resistance heat.

16
Figure 3 (a) Schematic illustration of the way to take the metallographic specimen and

drawing samples (b) Size of the tensile test sample.

17
Figure 4 (a-d) Partial surface enlargement of H-100, H-80, H-0, H-60. (e) Four

thin-walled square components manufactured by hot-wire arc additive

manufacturing

18
Figure 5 Macrostructure photographs of the cross sections manufactured by hot-wire

arc additive manufacturing. (a) H-0; (b) H-60; (c) H-80; (d) H-100.

19
Figure 6 (a) Schematic illusion of the molten pool section. (b-e) Schematic diagram of

grains growth morphology of H-0, H-60, H-80, H-100.

20
Figure 7 (a) Macrostructure cross section of sample H-0. (b) Microstructure at

unstable zone. (c) Microstructure at the interface of stable zone and unstable zone. (d)

Microstructure at stable zone.

21
Fig 8. OM images of (a) H-0; (b) H-60; (c) H-80; (d) H-100.

22
Fig 9.SEM images of microstructure; (a) H-60; (b) H-100.

23
Fig 10.Tensile properties of four groups in the longitudinal and transverse directions:

(a) ultimate tensile strength; (b) yield strength; (3) elongation rate

24
Fig 11 .The SEM images of the fracture surface: (a, c, e, g) Longitudinal direction of

H-0, H-60, H-80, H-100; (b, d, f, h) Transverse direction of H-0, H-60, H-80, H-100.

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Table 1.Four groups deposition parameters about this experiment

H-0 H-60 H-80 H-100

Hot-wire current(A) 0 60 80 100

Average current(A) 103.2 80.4 67 57.5

Average voltage(V) 14.5 13.6 12.8 11.5

Arc heat input(J/mm) 207 181 142 137

Wire feed velocity(cm/min) 100 100 100 100

Layer thickness(mm) 0.9 1.15 1.3 1.7

Table 2. Actual chemical composition used in this experiment

Element Ti Al Mo Zr Si Fe C N H O

Content (%) Rest 6.52 3.39 1.74 0.30 0.07 0.011 0.008 0.01 0.11

Table 3. Room temperature tensile properties of four groups

Groups Directions UTS(Mpa) YS(Mpa) EL(%)

L 873±23 806±41 23±2.5

H-0
T 988±33 810±23 9.17±1.8

L 871±28 786±21 19.9±6.6

H-60
T 970±5 887±5 10.7±0.4

L 863±27 774±25 20±6

H-80
T 956±15 810±27 12.6±0.5

L 929±5 835±3 12.6±2.1

H-100
T 944±9 840±11 12.8±2.4

26