Effect of Heat Treatment Condition on Microstructural and Mechanical Anisotropies of Selective Laser Melted Maraging 18Ni-300 Steel

Abstract

18Ni-300 maraging steel produced by the selective laser melting (SLM) process has a unique microstructure that is different from that of the same alloy processed by conventional methods. In this paper, maraging steels were fabricated by the selective laser melting process and their microstructures and mechanical properties were investigated in terms of post heat treatment conditions. Moreover, the effect of different heat treatments on the mechanical anisotropy was studied in detail. The micro Vickers hardness in the as-built state was around 340 Hv and could be increased to approximately 600 Hv by aging heat treatments. It was found that the solution heat treatment was not necessary to obtain a fully hardened state. From tensile tests of the maraging steels heat treated with different conditions, it was found that the highest strength was achieved by aging and solution treatment (ST) temperatures lower than the commonly used temperatures. In the direction parallel to the laser scanning, the highest ultimate tensile strength was obtained when 450 °C aging was done without solution heat treatment. In the other two directions tested, i.e., directions normal to the building and 45 degrees to the laser scanning direction, the highest tensile strength was obtained when aging was done at 450 °C after 750 °C solution treatment.