The influence of cooling conditions on grain size, secondary phase precipitates and mechanical properties of biomedical alloy specimens produced by investment casting

The objective of this work was to investigate and evaluate the effect of the cooling environment on the microstructure, secondary phase precipitates and mechanical properties of an as-cast cobalt alloy. The microstructure of castings has a large bearing on the mechanical properties, grain size, porosity and the morphology of carbide precipitates are thought to influence hardness, tensile strength and ductility. It is postulated that a greater understanding of microstructure and secondary phase precipitate response to casting parameters could lead to the optimisation of casting parameters and serve to reduce the requirement of thermo-mechanical treatments currently applied to refine as-cast structures and achieve adequate mechanical properties. Thermal analysis was performed to determine the critical stages of cooling. Ten millimetre diameter cylindrical specimens which could be machined into tension test specimens were cast and cooled under different conditions to impose different cooling rates. Analytical techniques such as optical microscopy (OM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDX), tensile testing and micro-hardness testing were used to study the specimens. Parameters studied include grain size, secondary dendrite arm spacing, secondary phase precipitates, porosity, hardness, ultimate tensile strength, yield strength and elongation. The microstructure of as-cast Co–28Cr–6Mo was found to consist of a dendritic matrix with secondary phases precipitated at grain boundaries and interdendritic zones. These secondary phase precipitates consist of carbides, rich in chromium and molybdenum. The size and area fraction of carbides was found to decrease significantly with increasing cooling rate while the micro-porosity was only marginally affected. The as-cast grains are illustrated for the first time showing a significant difference in size between insulated and naturally cooled specimens. The secondary dendrite arm spacing was determined to be significantly affected by the various cooling environments and the mechanical properties of hardness, ultimate tensile strength and yield strength all increased with increasing cooling rate while the ductility decreased. Correlations between microstructural features and mechanical properties are proposed.