Using Energy-Dispersive Laue Diffraction to Study Dislocation Arrangements in Materials Showing Wavy and Planar Slip Behavior

The present work shows an approach to monitor the evolution of the dislocation arrangement of a metallic material caused by cyclic plastic strain using white X-ray radiation in combination with an energy-dispersive detector. The method is demonstrated by single-shot experiments performed on polycrystalline nickel and α-brass, representing the pure wavy and the pure planar dislocation slip behavior. To correlate the resulting diffraction patterns with various dislocation arrangements of both metals, fatigue tests were carried out up to certain numbers of cycles and at predetermined plastic strain amplitudes. The differences in dislocation microstructure and internal stress distributions give rise to an appreciable change in the peak shape of Laue reflections, leading to unique characteristics in the respective diffraction patterns. Nickel reflections are elongated due to the high amount of cell structures leading to bending and misorientation of the lattice, whereas the present stacking faults in α-brass result in powder-like diffraction.