A New Method for the Microfocus X-ray Computed Tomography Visualization and Quantitative Exploration of Reinforcement Particles in Additively Manufactured Superalloy IN718

Abstract

This study presents a quantitative analysis of CeO₂ and TiB₂ non-metallic particles within the microstructure of additively manufactured (AM) Ni-superalloys Inconel 718 (IN718), using microfocus X-ray computed tomography (micro-XCT) and a volumetric analysis tool, CGAL VESPA Alpha Wrapping. Focusing on the characterization of CeO₂ and TiB₂ particles embedded within IN718, this method highlights their size and volume fraction variations as well as distinct spatial distributions, which are quantitatively compared to metallographically prepared SEM samples. Quantitative assessments conducted with Paraview served as the basis for optimizing alpha and offset parameters for surface construction. This optimized data processing routine yields volume and surface morphology estimations that more closely align with those obtained from SEM observations, compared to the traditional Marching Cubes algorithm, assuming identical preprocessing and binarization standards. The flexibility to adjust the wrapping parameters also allows for precise control over volumetric and surface area estimations. The results demonstrated that CGAL VESPA Alpha Wrapping, implemented in Paraview for object identification, enables simultaneous evaluation of particle morphology and authentic volumetric information from the same micro-XCT data, particularly for non-uniformly distributed reinforcement particles. This capability supports a more reliable non-destructive evaluation for AM components.