Uncommon Cold-Rolling Faults in an Fe-Mn-Si-Cr Shape-Memory Alloy

The paper analyzes the occurrence of evenly spaced cracks on the surface of lamellar specimens of Fe-28Mn-6Si-5Cr (mass %) shape-memory alloy (SMA), during cold rolling. The specimens were hot rolled and normalized and developed cold rolling cracks with an approximate spacing of about 1.3 mm and a depth that increased with the thickness-reduction degree. At normalized specimens, X-ray diffraction patterns revealed the presence of multiple crystallographic variants of brittle alpha ' body-bcc martensite, which could be the cause of cold-rolling cracking. Both normalized and cold-rolled specimens were analyzed using scanning electron microscopy SEM. SEM micrographs revealed the presence of several crystallographic variants of alpha '-body-centered cubic (bcc) and epsilon hexagonal close-packed (hcp) martensite plates within a gamma-face-centered cubic (fcc) austenite matrix in a normalized state. High-resolution SEM, recorded after 25% thickness reduction by cold-rolling, emphasized the ductile character of the cracks by means of an array of multiple dimples. After additional 33% cold-rolling thickness reduction, the surface of crack walls became acicular, thus revealing the fragile character of failure. It has been argued that the specimens cracked in the neutral point but preserved their integrity owing to the ductile character of gamma-fcc austenite matrix.