Residual stress fields analysis in rolled Zircaloy-4 plates: Grazing incidence diffraction and elastoplastic self-consistent model

An experimental and theoretical investigation was carried out to study the in-depth distribution of residual stress after a cold-rolling test in a zirconium alloy. Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction was used to analyze the heterogeneous stress field with regard to different diffraction volumes below the surface of the sample. An interpretation of the intergranular stress analysis based on in-depth stress development has been made using an elastoplastic self-consistent model in order to account for the effect of plastic anisotropy. The contribution and the magnitude of both the first- and second-order residual stresses as a function of the penetration depth has been correctly evaluated using information from the model. The results show the complementarity of the methods used.