High-throughput investigation of Nb and Ta alloying effects on the microstructure and properties of a novel Ni-Co-based superalloy

Recent research has focused on the development of disk superalloys with better temperature capability and mechanical properties via a new alloying concept that uses high levels of Co and γ′ formers of Al, Ti, Ta and Nb to produce composite precipitation strengthening. In this work, alloying effects of Nb and Ta on phase stability, microstructure and property of a novel Ni-Co-based superalloy were systematically investigated using the high-throughput multi-component diffusion multiples (MCDMs) in combination with various high-throughput measurement tools. A deep learning-based image recognition method was developed to efficiently extract the γ′ morphological features, including area fraction, particle size, number density. The rapid characterizations of alloy compositions, microstructure and Vickers hardness (HV) enable us to establish the composition-dependent microstructural characteristics and mechanical property as well as their correlation with the phase stability, which can be directly applied for designing Ni-Co-based superalloys with superior microstructure stability and strength.