Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

ScienceDirect
Materials Today: Proceedings 2S (2015) S913 – S916

International Conference on Martensitic Transformations, ICOMAT-2014

Block boundary analyses to identify martensite and bainite

S. Moritoa,*, A.H. Phamb, T. Hayashic, T. Ohbaa
a
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Shimane University, Matsue 690-8504, Japan.
b
Center for the Promotion of Project Research, Shimane University, Matsue 690-8504, Japan.
c
Department of Materials Analysis, CIRS, Shimane University, Matsue 690-8504, Japan.

Abstract

Identification of martensite and bainite in the ferrous alloys is difficult because both morphologies contain similar complex
microstructures. Recently, it was pointed out that the frequencies of block boundaries in the morphologies are different from each
other. In the present study, a simple method for identifying martensite and bainite using the profile of block boundaries is
suggested. This method was applied for upper and lower bainites and lath martensite in Fe–0.6mass%C alloy. The lower bainite
can be separated by the ratio of 52 degrees / <011>α' boundaries. Furthermore lath martensite and upper bainite are identified
using near twin block boundaries and block boundary density.
© 2015
© 2014TheTheAuthors.
Authors.Published
Published
byby Elsevier
Elsevier Ltd.Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
Selection and Peer-review under responsibility of the chairs of the International Conference on Martensitic Transformations
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
2014. This
Selection andisPeer-review
an open access
underarticle under the
responsibility of CC BY-NC-ND
the chairs license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
of the International Conference on Martensitic Transformations 2014.

Keywords: Lath Martensite; Bainite; Crystallography; Grain Boundary

1. Introduction

Bainite and martensite steels, which are high strength and ductile industrial materials, contain complex
morphologies, such as prior austenite grain, packet, block, sub–block and lath (or bainitic ferrite) [1-3]. The
morphologies in the steels, i.e. lath martensite, upper and lower bainites, are similar to each other, although their
mechanical properties are different.

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +81-852-32-6398; fax: +0-000-000-0000 .

E-mail address: mosh@riko.shimane-u.ac.jp

2214-7853 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Selection and Peer-review under responsibility of the chairs of the International Conference on Martensitic Transformations 2014.
doi:10.1016/j.matpr.2015.07.430
914 S. Morito et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2S (2015) S913 – S916

Recent developments in crystallographic analysis, e.g. electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) analysis, allow us
to analyse the microstructures. From the EBSD analyses, it is found that the morphology has specific features in the
boundaries. For example, Lambert et al. showed the frequency of the adjacent variant pair depended on each
morphology [2]. Takayama et al. also indicated that the profiles of the boundaries ratio in upper bainite also depend
on their morphologies [3]. This information shows the possibility of a new distinction method for martensite and
bainite. However, they used special software for analysing these morphological features.
In the present study, a simple method to distinguish between martensite and bainite is proposed using the profile
of block boundaries.

2. Analysis methods

Base concept of this method is to pick up the specific boundary features in the morphologies using EBSD
measurements, e.g. amount of the block boundaries and boundary densities. To apply crystallographic analyses, it is
necessary to redefine the morphological terms from crystallographic viewpoint as follows. A packet is a lath group
with the same close–packed plane parallel relationship with austenite, i.e. CP group [3]. A block is a lath group with
the same lattice correspondence, i.e. Bain group [3] or crystallographic packet [2], in a packet. A sub–block is a
group of laths with a single Kurdjumov–Sachs (KS) variant. In these morphologies, there are many types of
boundaries. To identify the morphologies, the block and sub–block boundaries are used, because the frequency of
the block boundaries has specific features [1–4]. The definition of KS variants and block boundaries in a packet are
shown in Table 1 [1]. The block boundaries are classified into four types. The theoretical misorientation angles and
axes between the blocks are based on an ideal KS orientation relationship. In the analysis, the misorientation
between the blocks is termed in "experimental misorientation" in Table 1, because the orientation relationship shifts
from a KS to a Nishiyama–Wassermann (NW) orientation relationship [5].

Table 1. KS variants in a packet. The close–packed plane relationship is fixed to (111)γ // (011)α'. The variant numbers are defined from Ref. 1.

Variant Close–packed Theoretical misorientation Experimental misorientation

number direction relationship angle and axis with V1 angle and axis with V1
V1 [1̄01]γ // [1̄1̄1]α' – –
V2 [1̄01]γ // [1̄11̄]α' 60.0°/[111̄]α' = 70.5°/[01̄1̄]α' 68°/<011>α'
V3 [011̄]γ // [1̄1̄1]α' 60.0°/[011]α' 60°/<011>α'
V4 [011̄]γ // [1̄11̄]α' 10.5°/[01̄1̄]α' 7°/<011>α'
V5 [11̄0]γ // [1̄1̄1]α' 60.0°/[01̄1̄]α' 60°/<011>α'
V6 [11̄0]γ // [1̄11̄]α' 49.5°/[011]α' 52°/<011>α'

3. Experimental procedures

The specific boundary method was applied to the upper (lath–like) bainite, lower (plate–like) bainite [6] and lath
martensite in the Fe–0.61C–0.014Si–0.01Mn–0.003P–0.005S (mass%) alloy. All specimens were austenitized at
1273K for 1.8ks. The specimens contained upper and lower bainites were prepared by aging at 673 K and 573 K for
600s after austenitization, respectively [7]. Lath martensite was obtained by water quenching after austenitization.
The EBSD measurement was carried out using JEOL JSM–7001FA operated at 15 kV, scan step was 0.1 μm and the
patterns were indexed as alpha–iron phase (bcc metal). The area was consecutively scanned four times with a scan
area of 50×50 μm. The EBSD data was cleaned to replace small independent regions with less than five points. The
Bain and boundary maps were prepared using OIM analysis Ver. 6.2 of TSL–EDAX, which is a standard part of
EBSD software packages. To prepare the CP maps, software for austenite reconstruction from martensite [8] was
also used. The boundaries in the maps were drawn based on Table 1 and their tolerance angle was four degrees.
 S. Morito et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2S (2015) S913 – S916 915

4. Results and discussion

Figures 1(a)-(c), (d)-(f) and (g)-(i) are coloured maps on the grey–scaled image quality maps of the lath
martensite, lower and upper bainites, respectively. The maps in the 1st column, Fig. 1(a), (d) and (g), are the image
quality maps with coloured Bain groups. Fig. 1(j) shows the colour scale for the maps, and each colour corresponds
with the lattice correspondence between each <001>γ and [001]α'. The independent regions in a packet correspond
to the blocks. Figures show the thickness of the lath martensite is finer than that of the bainites, and lower bainite
has finer blocks than upper bainite. The Bain maps help to identify upper bainite formed at high temperature in the
low carbon steels [2, 3], though it must be noted it is difficult to easily identify in the present study.

Fig. 1. Coloured maps on the grey–scaled image quality maps of (a~c) lath martensite, (d~f) lower and (g~i) upper bainites. The 1st, 2nd and 3rd
columns are coloured Bain group, CP group and block boundaries maps, respectively. The colour scales are shown in Fig. 1(j~l).
916 S. Morito et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2S (2015) S913 – S916

The 2nd column maps, Fig. 1(b), (e) and (h), are the image quality maps with coloured CP groups. Figure 1(k) is
the colour scale for the maps, and each colour corresponds with the common close–packed plane in austenite. In
lower bainite, many plate–like small packets exist inside a large packet parallel to the trace of the large packet. The
relationship between the plate–like packet and surrounding variants is V1–V8, displaying similar orientations with
the same elongated directions. Furthermore, the plate–like packets tend to appear inside the blocks. We can use this
feature to identify the morphologies, but the CP maps were prepared by our specific software [8].
The maps in the 3rd column, Fig. 1(c), (f) and (i), are the image quality maps with coloured block boundaries.
Figure 1(l) shows the colour corded relationship between types of block boundaries. Lower bainite contains large
amount of V1–V6 boundaries [9], and the density of the block boundaries in lath martensite is higher than that in
upper bainite. These features are recognized from the coloured boundary maps easily, and the morphologies are
identified from their features visually. The identification using visual method depends on the person. For quantitative
evaluation, it is also necessary to describe frequency and density of the boundaries numerically. The frequency and
density of the boundaries are shown in Figs. 2(a) and (b), respectively. Figure 2(a) indicates the characteristic
frequency of the V1–V6 boundaries in the lower bainite. Furthermore, lath martensite and upper bainite are
characterised using block boundary densities as shown in Fig. 2(b). Morphologies can be identified from these
characteristic values numerically.

Fig. 2. (a) The frequencies and (b) densities of the block boundaries in the morphologies. The error bar indicates maximum and minimum
frequencies and densities of the block boundaries.

5. Conclusions

We propose a new method for effectively identifying martensite and bainite. This method is useful for not only
visual identification but also semi–quantitative evaluation. Furthermore, the method is capable of wide application,
i.e. ultra–low carbon to high carbon lath martensite, upper and lower bainite.

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Professors T. Furuhara, G. Miyamoto at Tohoku University and H. Terasaki at Osaka
University for valuable discussion.

References

[1] S. Morito, H. Tanaka, R. Konishi, T. Furuhara, T. Maki, Acta Mater. 51 (2003) 1789–1799.
[2] A. Lambert–Perlade, A.F. Gourgues, A. Pineau, Acta Mater. 52 (2004) 2337–2348.
[3] N. Takayama, G. Miyamoto, T. Furuhara, Acta Mater. 60 (2012) 2387–2396.
[4] A. Stormvinter, G. Miyamoto, T. Furuhara, P. Hedström, A. Borgenstam. Acta Mater. 60 (2012), 7265–7274.
[5] S. Morito, X. Huang, T. Furuhara, T. Maki, N. Hansen, Acta Mater. 54 (2006) 5323–5331.
[6] Y. Ohmori, H. Ohtani, T. Kunitake, Trans. ISIJ. 11 (1971) 250–259.
[7] M. Oka, H. Okamoto, J. Phys. IV France 5 (1995) C8-503–508.
[8] A.H. Pham, T. Ohba, S. Morito, T. Hayashi, Mater. Trans. 54 (2013) 1396–1402.
[9] H. Ohkusa, S. Morito, T. Ohba, T. Hayashi, Collected Abstracts of the 2012 Spring Meeting of JIM, JIM, Sendai, Japan, 2012, pp. 186.