Large-scale dislocation dynamics simulations of strain hardening of Ni microcrystals under tensile loading

Abstract The strain hardening in FCC Ni was studied along low index directions using 3-dimensional discrete dislocation dynamics. Large (20 × 20 × 50 μm) Ni microcrystals were simulated using rectangular parallelepiped-cells loaded in tension along four low-index directions ([111], [001], [110] and [112]) to shear strains of ∼0.01–0.02. Loading was at a constant strain rate of 10/sec, and all surfaces of the cell are treated as free surfaces. The FCC dislocation mobility routines were modified to include thermally activated cross-slip processes, as a function of three different stress components, using the results of previous atomistic simulations. These include bulk cross slip (cross-slip at atomic jogs), intersection cross slip (attractive and repulsive) as well as surface cross slip. One of these, repulsive intersection cross-slip, has zero activation energy and is present at all simulated deformation temperatures. The simulations were performed for three different temperatures, 5, 150 and 300 K. The strain-hardening rate is independent of temperature and of the order of μ/200 – μ/400, in agreement with experimental data for the and orientations of deformation. For the [001] orientation, at 5 and 150 K, the strain hardening rate decreases considerably when repulsive intersection cross-slip is removed from the simulations. The [110] and [112] orientations exhibit single-slip glide and a very low strain-hardening rate (∼μ/3000). Heterogeneity of dislocation microstructure develops spontaneously at the higher temperatures as a result of increased cross slip. Even though the strain-hardening rate is independent of temperature, the increase in dislocation density with shear strain is larger at higher temperatures. It is proposed that higher temperatures deformation produces larger dislocation-microstructure heterogeneities, providing for higher average dislocation densities and regions of low density where deformation can proceed. Also, the strain hardening rate at 300 K is controlled by the rate of increase of forest dislocation density in these lean regions.