Textures and Microstructures, 1990, Vol. 13, pp. 1-14 1990 Gordon and Breach Science Publishers S.A.

Reprints available directly from the publisher. Printed in the United Kingdom
Photocopying permitted by license only

DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS:

NICKEL-BASE SUPERALLOYS FOR
GAS TURBINES
JACQUES LACAZE and ALAIN HAZOTTE
Laboratoire de Science et G#nie des Mat#riaux M#talliques, Ecole des Mines,
54042 Nancy cdex, France
(Received 20 December 1989)
From the first forged turbine blades made of iron base alloys to the present nickel base single-grain
turbine blades and vanes manufactured by directional solidification, an enormous amount of research
has been directed to attaining the hottest possible combustion chamber temperatures in jet engines.
Temperature has been increased by about 15 K each year for the last two decades, improving the
thermodynamic efficiency of the engines. The more recent developments concern the manufacturing
of single-grain parts made of nickel base superalloys with large amount of the ,’ hardening phase.
This paper first presents the directional solidification process used to produce single-grain parts, the
formation of as-cast microstructures and the defects that can arise during solidification. In the second
part the thermal treatments that are applied to the nickel base superalloys in order to enhance their
mechanical properties are detailed. The effect of crystallographic orientation and of the
mierostructure on the mechanical properties is briefly presented, as well as the microstructural
changes that can possibly arise during service.

KEY WORDS Directional solidification, nickel base superalloys, microstructures, high temperature
mechanical properties.

INTRODUCTION
In order to improve the efficiency of jet engines, an enormous amount of research
has been directed to increasing the temperature of the gas coming from the
combustion chamber and entering the turbine (the turbine inlet temperature). As
illustrated in Figure 1, this temperature has increased by about 15 K each year for
the last two decades, leading to an improvement of thrust for military engines or
a reduction of fuel consumption in the case of civil engines. Thus the main
requirements for materials used in gas turbines are determined by the tempera-
ture capabilities of the rotating blades, their creep resistance at high temperature,
good resistance to thermal fatigue and to oxidation/corrosion. According to
McLean (1983), a practical rule states that one third of the total damage
undergone by the material is due to fatigue and two thirds to creep.
The main process changes and alloy developments that led to the improvement
in turbine capabilities are schematized in Figure 1. Between the forties and the
sixties, wrought alloys changed from Fe-base to Ni-base alloys as the introduction
of nickel with aluminum and titanium led to the formation of ,’ precipitates,

I" This paper was presented at the COMETI" Symposium "Anisotropic and Microheterogeneous
Materials", Metz, France, December 1989.
2 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOTFE
1600

1400

1200

lOOO

800

600
1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

Figure 1 Evolution of the gas temperature at the entry of turbines (turbine inlet temperature) during
the last decades, related to successive changes in the processes.

isomorphic to the NiaAI phase, which increase the creep resistance of the
materials. Modern alloys for high temperature airfoils do not contain any iron at
all but are composed of nickel with a number of alloying elements that have
different roles; Al, Ta, Ti and Nb enter in the y’ phase and increase the quantity
of precipitates; W, Cr or Mo are added as y solid-solution strengtheners and
increase the amount of carbide, if any; Co increases the high temperature stability
of the precipitates. The introduction of the vacuum melting technique in the
sixties allowed casting of alloys with larger amounts of reactive elements such as
aluminum and titanium. The amount of the strengthening phase became so high
that forging was no longer possible since the temperature interval for thermo-
mechanical treatments was situated at a higher temperature; this led to the use of
investment casting for manufacturing airfoils.
IN100 or MARM200 (see Table 1) are typical alloys developed in the 60’s for
manufacturing turbine blades with equiaxed structures by conventional casting in
molds achieved by the lost wax process. These alloys, which are still in use for
sub-critical parts of the engines, contain about 40% y’ and 5% carbides. The y’
phase precipitates in the y (Ni) matrix and hardens it when the carbides are
intergranular and increases the resistance of the grain boundaries. Boron,
hafnium and zirconium are added in order to reduce crack initiation at grain
boundaries. The optimum efficiency of the carbides as grain boundary strengthe-
ners is obtained after appropriate heat treatment (Sims, 1978).
A further improvement of the materials was achieved by considering the actual
Table 1 Composition (in wt%) of some nickel base superalloys

AI Co Cr Mo Ta Ti W B C V Zr
IN100 5.5 15 10 3.0 4.7 0.014 0.18 1.0 0.06
MAR M200 5 10 9 2.0 12.5 0.015 0.14 0.05
PWA 1480 5 5 10 12 1.5 4
CM SX2 5.5 5 8 0.5 6 1 8
AM1 5.2 6.5 7.5 2.0 8.5 1.2 5.5
Note: for D.S. applications, MAR M200 alloy also contains 1% Nb and 2% Hf
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS 3

demands made of airfoils. It was first noted that for materials with equiaxed
structures, creep fractures and thermal fatigue failures were always associated
with grain boundaries. As service stresses are mainly due to centrifugal
acceleration along the airfoil direction, it became obvious that directional
structures could increase the mechanical properties of the blades in service by
suppressing the transverse grain boundaries which were the weakest points; this
has been achieved by using directional solidification (D.S.) to produce the
material. The advantages of these structures over conventional equiaxed struc-
tures was an increase of the thermal fatigue capability and of the rupture life and
ductility (VerSnyder, 1982). Finally the introduction during the 70’s of cooled
blades allowed a further increase in the engine thrust. Cooling with cold air taken
from the compressor allowed for a temperature difference between gas and metal
that can be as high as 500C in the modern engines.
The present last step of the evolution has been the introduction of single grain
manufacturing of airfoils which led to a drastic change of the definition of the
alloys, as elements acting as grain boundaries strengtheners (C, B, Zr, Hf) could
be eliminated. Recently designed alloys such as AM1, CMSX2 or PWA 1480
(Table 1), have important advantages over previous alloys. Their incipient
melting temperature as well as their solvus temperature are increased, thus
increasing their performance, and yet these temperatures are still sufficiently
different to allow full solutionizing heat treatments that were not possible in the
case of alloys of the first generation.

CASTING OF SINGLE-GRAIN PARTS

Practice of Directional Solidification of Nickel-base Alloys
Conventional or directional solidification of modern nickel based.superalloys is
achieved by investment casting using the lost wax process. This process, which
has been in use for art manufacturing for several thousand years, is a convenient
way to realise near net-shape casting with austenitic and refractory steels and
nickel and cobalt based superalloys as well as light alloys (Zanghi, 1988). In this
technique the mold is prepared from a .preform made of wax on which successive
layers of ceramics are deposited. After drying the mold is dewaxed and then heat
treated.
The thermal and mechanical characteristics of the mold shell must be
compatible with the casting process. First of all the ceramics have to retain
sufficient high temperature mechanical properties as the mold is subjected to
creep due to the weight of the metal. Secondly the inner ceramic layers must be
chemically resistant to the liquid metal for a sufficiently long time in order to
avoid compositional changes of the metal and deleterious additions of exogeneous
particles. These problems became evident as the casting time was increased when
the D.S. process was introduced. Finally the thermal conductivity and the heat
capacity of the mold must be carefully chosen as it is necessary for the D.S.
process to ensure that the liquidus isotherm is planar. Alumina based ceramics
are generally used because they present both satisfactory mechanical characteris-
tics and good thermal conductivity.
As pointed out in the introduction, one of the major increases in turbine inlet
temperature was due to the development of air cooled blades and vanes. The
corresponding shapes are achieved by means of ceramic cores inserted in the wax
4 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOITE

1700

1600

1500

1400
blades with forced convection

1200

1100

IOO0

uncooled blades
900

1960 190 1980 1990 2000

Year of development

Figure 2 Schematic representation of blade sections illustrating the evolution of the cooling ducts.
(After Herteman, 1985)
pattern and that remain in place in the mold during the solidification process.
These cores, which can be silica or alumina based, are later removed from the
parts by dissolving them in acid. The possibilities of this technique were so great
that a progressive new design of the blades was achieved, from the simple hollow
to the very complex air circulating circuits illustrated in Figure 2. In future
turbine blades, air cooling will be ensured through forced convection and
turbulent flow inside the blades and through a cooling film on the exposed outer
surface of the blades.
In the case of the directional solidification process it is particularly important to
avoid the possible nucleation of new grains on the mold surface, essentially due to
undercooling of the liquid metal ahead of the solidification front. One way to
avoid this undesirable phenomenon is to increase the temperature gradient at the
solidification front; this idea led to the development of heated furnaces in place of
the simpler liquid cooling process (Figure 3). These furnaces have two chambers,
a cold and a hot one. The alloy is melted under vacuum in a pouring cup in the
hot chamber and then poured in the mold which was first preheated (1100C) and
degassed in the "cold" chamber. The mold stands on a cooled copper chill surface
on which solidification starts and is then withdrawn from the furnace. When
single grain parts are to be manufactured, there is a grain selector in the lower
part of the mold.

Formation of the Directional Solidification Structures

The actual solidification structures of an alloy depend on the processing
parameters, primarily the temperature gradient G at the solidification front and
the solidification rate V, which is roughly equal to the withdrawal rate. For a
given thermal gradient the increase in the withdrawal rate from very low to very
high values makes the solidification front change from planar to cellular,
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS 5

: radiation p0urln o
o
* heating cup

,oo

radiation ceramic mold

cooltng
air fall

seed copper cooled chill

rn selector
support shft

lmre 3 Schematic view of the hot chamber of a D.S. furnace with the mould standing on cooled
copper support.

columnar (or directional) dendritic and finally equiaxed dendritic as illustrated on

Figure 4. In the industrial D.S. process the thermal gradient is in the range 20 to
60 K cm -1 and, for productivity reasons, the solidification rate is the highest
possible, typically 4 to 10ram per minute. Columnar dendritic structures are
formed of primary trunks whose tips grow ahead in the liquid and develop
transversely through the formation of secondary arms as illustrated in Figure 5.
Dendrites grow preferentially in the crystallographic [001] direction and their
arms in the two perpendicular (001) directions. In nickel base superalloys these
crystallographic directions are associated with low elastic moduli. This ensures
better thermal fatigue resistance as the level of thermal strains remains low.

I t
101

100
equiaxed-dendri

10-3
t
].
ar planar
supercooling

10-4 .-,
lO0 lo o2 loz Io 4
-1
Thermal gradient (K.cm

Figure 4 Effect of the thermal gradient G and the solidification rate V on the type of solidification
structures that develop. The square represents the domain in which it is industrially possible to
achieve the D.S. process.
6 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOTTE

Figure$ SEM photograph of an array of growing columnar dendrites (by courtesy of E. Gardaix).
Average distance between dendrite trunks is 350 #m.

Due to the cooling rates undergone by the metal during the phase change,
solidification proceeds off-equilibrium and leads to local chemical heterogeneities
called microsegregation. Microsegregation is caused by solutes partitioning
between liquid and solid at the scale of the dendrites or dendrites arms. During
solidification the composition of the liquid varies continuously as does that of the
successive layers of solid. Since the solid state diffusion rate is low with respect to
the usual cooling rates, this leads to the build-up of microsegregation and to the
final precipitation of off-equilibrium ),-),’ eutectic. Near the end of solidification
however, some solid state diffusion can occur for the faster diffusing elements as
aluminum.
The main consequences of microsegregation are illustrated in the micrographs
of Figure 6 that were taken on polished and chemically etched sections parallel to
the growth direction: the chemical heterogeneity of the as-cast material (left) and
the common appearance of off-equilibrium phases, like the ,’ phase in the ,-),’
eutectic (right). The formation of macrosegregation, that is chemical heteroge-
neities at the scale of the cast parts, is associated with both microsegregation and
cross-sectional area changes (Sellamuthu, Brody and Giamei, 1986). This is to be
avoided as it is a major defect detrimental to mechanical properties which cannot
be eliminated through usual heat treatments.
In general solid-state ,’ precipitation begins just after the end of solidification
during the casting process. This is a great advantage of the new generation alloys
in that they present a temperature "window", that is a temperature interval
between the solvus temperature and the incipient melting temperature, in which
full solutionizing of the ),’ precipitates and chemical homogenization are possible.
The efficiency of the heat treatments is related to the dimensions over which
chemical heterogeneities have built up. These dimensions are those of the
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS 7

Figure 6 Micrographs of longitudinal sections (parallel to the growth direction) illustrating chemical
heterogeneities, microsegregation at the scale of the dendrites (a) and off-equilibrium ),-),’ eutectic
(b) in as-cast material.

dendritic structure, the average distance between dendrite axes and the secondary
and occasionally the tertiary arms spacings (Flemings, 1974). A convenient way
for estimating the size of a dendritic array like the one shown in Figure 7, is to
measure the density of primary axes np (Lacaze, 1987), which varies with the
solidification parameters G and V according to a relation of the form np
A" G- V5.
A depends on alloy composition but also on the solidification conditions (Kurz
and Fisher, 1983), and this can account for the large discrepancies concerning the
experimental values of the exponents of G and V reported in the literature. One
of the reasons for the variations of A is tip undercooling at the solidification front
that causes the actual solidification interval to vary. This tip undercooling is due
to solute redistribution around the dendrite tips when growing. It varies
essentially with V but can also depend on the temperature gradient when the
gradient is large. The undercooling exists in a zone in the liquid, ahead of the
solidification front, which has a liquidus temperature lower than the nominal
liquidus temperature of the alloy. In this zone, nucleation of new crystals is
theoretically possible and their effective growth will depend on the undercooling
of the front and on the temperature gradient in the liquid. This explains the
transition from columnar to equiaxed growth illustrated in Figure 5. There exists
a maximum withdrawal rate for D.S. manufacturing as the risk for nucleation of
new grains above the solidification front increases with the tip undercooling.
As pointed out above the progress of solidification behind the front is associated
with the formation of dendrite arms initiated as perturbations of the dendrite tips.
8 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOT’I’E

Figure 7 Micrograph of a transverse section of a single grain showing the array of dendrites which
appear as white crosses.

It has been shown (Flemings, 1974) that the final size d of these arms depends on
the local cooling rate of the metal and is determined by coarsening, so that one
has:
d3 a. tso (4)
where a depends solely on the alloy composition and tso is the local time for
completion of solidification.
Another very important defect encountered in cast materials consists of
cavities, either porosity or microcracks. Both of them are thought to appear at
the end of solidification, the first due to a lack of liquid feeding to compensate for
solidification shrinkage and the second due to stress and strain build-up as the
solid part of the casting is becoming stronger. A sufficient liquid metal feeding in
the last zones to solidify will lead to safe products, avoiding formation of pores
and eventually healing hot tears. However capillary feeding becomes more and
more difficult as solidification proceeds to its end because of the dynamic pressure
drop; if the local pressure in the liquid falls below a critical value (which
practically depends on the gas content of the metal) then porosity is likely to
appear. The formation of pores actually depends on nucleation phenomena and
on the size of the interdendritic zone; porosity will have more difficulty appearing
in fine dendritic structures. However one can predict that decreasing the size of
the solidification structure leads to an increase of the dynamic pressure drop, so
that there must exist an optimum value of the casting conditions in order to get a
minimum risk of porosity formation or to have fine evenly distributed porosities
(Bachelet and Lesoult, 1978). Hafnium has been added to some D.S. superalloys
to increase their castability through the increase of off-equilibrium eutectic,
allowing for a decrease of the porosity tendancy and crack formation. In
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIHED MATERIALS 9

superalloys of the second generation, this type of element is avoided, but

fortunately directional solidification leads to less porosity formation than conven-
tional casting. In any case the Hot Isostatic Pressure process can be used to
suppress porosities that appear during solidification or due to the thermal heat
treatments described below.

SOLID STATE HEAT TREATMENTS AND MECHANICAL

PROPERTIES
Strengthening Mechanisms
The high temperature properties of single crystal nickel-based superalloys
essentially result from two contributions: strengthening by precipitation of the
phase and solid solution strengthening of both ), and ,’ phases by alloying
elements. Ti, Nb and Ta reinforce the
phase. The chemistry of the successive generations of nickel base alloys evolved
in order to increase these strengthening effects, especially by increasing the
amount of ,’ precipitates which has reached 70% in the last generation of
superalloys. Fredholm (1987) showed that, in these alloys, the volume fraction of
precipitates is roughly constant between room temperature and 1050C.
Figure 8 shows a typical ),-),’ microstructure of alloy CM SX2 resulting from a
heat treatment which will be discussed later. Both and ),’ phases have the same
,
f.c.c, crystallographic structure except that the ),’ phase is ordered ("L12"
structure) whereas the phase is a disordered solid solution. This fact, together
with a difference in the distribution of the alloying elements between the two
phases, results in slight difference in their lattice parameters which is often
expressed by the misfit (or mismatch) parameter, given as:
di 2(a ’ a ) !(a ’ + a) (2)
where a v and a v, ,
are the lattice parameters of the and ),’ phases respectively.
For current industrial alloys, di roughly ranges between 0.5% and -0.5%,
depending on the temperature and on the mean chemical composition. It is
generally found to be negative at service temperatures, as the thermal expansion
coefficient of ),’ is lower than that of

Figure $ Typical ),-,’ microstructure of a single crystal nickel based superalloy observed on a
section parallel to one of the {100} crystallographic planes.
10 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOTI’E

Resulting from the specificity of the ),-),’ mixture, four different mechanisms
are thought to contribute to the high temperature precipitation hardening of these
alloys:
as the y’ phase is ordered the dislocations have to dissociate in order to enter
the precipitates, which results in a high shear energy,
-the ),’ phase presents an unusual mechanical behaviour since its flow stress is
known to increase with increasing temperature reaching a maximum around
700C (Sims, 1972),
-the lattice discrepancy between the two phases results in strong elastic
stresses at the ,-),’ interface,
-the high amount of coherent strengthening phase also results in a strong
elastic interaction between precipitates; these last two phenomena both
increase the difficulty of bypassing of the precipitates by dislocations gliding
along the ),-),’ interface.
All these mechanisms plus solid-solution strengthening improve the mechanical
properties of the single crystal alloys. However their respective contributions are
not exactly quantified, even if the strengthening effect of the y-),’ interface
appears to be preponderant.

Solid State Heat Treatments

For a given chemical composition, i.e. a given amount of strengthening phase, the
mechanical properties of a single crystal nickel base alloy can still be enhanced by
optimizing the morphology of the ),-),’ mixture by means of appropriate heat
treatments. In the case of alloy CM SX2, Caron and Khan (1983) showed that the
following sequence of heat treatments (known as "ONERA treatment") leads to
the best high temperature creep behaviour:
i) 3 hours at 1315C, then air cooled:
This temperature is in the solutionizing window, hence this step is used to
dissolve the ),-),’ eutectics and to smooth the chemical segregations resulting
from the casting process. Figure 9 illustrates the effect of this treatment as can be
seen by optical microscopy on chemically etched structures.

(a) (b)
Figure 9 Effect of solutionizing treatment on microsegregation in a CMSX2 single crystal: optical
micrographs showing the dendritic solidification structure (a) before and (b) after 3 hours at 1300C.
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS 11

ii) 16 hours at 1050C, air cooled:

This second treatment promotes the coarsening of the y’ precipitates up to their
optimum size which has been experimentally determined to be 0.45/zm in the
case of CM SX2. This high temperature coarsening at constant volume fraction of
precipitates is known as "Oswald ripening."
iii) 48 hours at 850C, air cooled:
The actual effects of this final "stabilization" step are not fully understood,
although it was shown to be useful. It is thought to allow some retained alloying
elements to migrate from the matrix into precipitates and also perhaps to modify
the local chemical composition at the y-y’ interface.
The microstructure resulting from such a heat treatment is shown in Figure 8 in
the case of CM SX2 alloy. The same type of treatment has also been shown to be
successfull for other single crystal superalloys. It could be surprising that the area
decrease of the y-y’ interface related to coarsening of the precipitates during the
last two steps can result in strengthening of the material, while the interface was
previously noted to have the main strengthening effects. In fact it is not obvious
that the optimum mechanical characteristics determined experimentally cor-
respond only to a size effect since the coarsening of the precipitates also results in
a more complex microstructural evolution"
-due to the competition between their volume, interracial and interaction
energies, the precipitates encounter successive shape changes when coarsening,
the usual sequence being spheroid then cuboid (see Figure 8), then platelet if
the coarsening treatment is too long,
-as the mean size of the precipitates increase, their size distribution become
sharper while their spatial repartition is also modified: from initially evenly
distributed the precipitates progressively align along the (100) directions; these
changes, which are not forecast by the classical theories concerning Oswald
ripening, are related to a minimization of the y’-y’ interaction energy,
-the morphological changes also correspond to a modification of the crystal-
lographic and perhaps also chemical structure of the y-y’ interface; for
instance it is likely that the transition from cuboids to platelets is related to a
progressive loss of coherency between the two phases.
The final treatment of the turbine blades before use is the application of a coating
which will give them resistance to high temperature oxidation and corrosion. The
coating is made of different layers specifically designed to protect against high or
low temperature corrosion, high temperature oxidation and eventually completed
with a thermal barrier layer. Aluminum and chromium that enter the base
material play an important role against oxidation as these elements build up oxide
layers. When coatings are applied by vapor phase deposition, the cycle can
include heat treatments of the material. Rhys-Jones and Bettridge (1987) have
recently proposed a review of the state of the art of this important final
preparation of the airfoils, which partly determines the life time in service.

Anisotropy of Mechanical Properties

As expected from a single crystal, the mechanical behaviour of the nickel base
superalloys is strongly anisotropic. This is illustrated in Fig. 10 where it can be
12 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOTTE

(c) 84
/...o
1138.8.8759. 664 4-4
[001] [011]
Figure 10 Stress rupture life (in hours) at 760C and 750 MPa of CM SX2 single crystals as a function
of their orientation reported in the stereographic triangle (by courtesy of Caron et al., 1988).

seen that the stress rupture life in uniaxial traction creep test depends on the
direction of the applied stress with regard to the crystal lattice. This orientation
dependance of the mechanical behaviour was shown to be related to the
temperature, to the type of mechanical test (creep, fatigue, dynamic strain,
etc...) and even to the morphology of the y-y’ mixture.
Practically this anisotropy of mechanical behaviour is not too cumbersome for
uncooled turbine blades as they are stressed essentially in the (001) directions of
the single crystal. However as their geometry becomes more and more compli-
cated, the actual orientation map of the local stresses during service becomes
more and more complex. Hence it is necessary to characterize the mechanical
behaviour of the material more precisely in order to improve the structure
calculations.

Microstructural Changes under Mechanical Stress

At the highest service temperatures (i.e. between about 900C and 1100C) the
morphology of the y-y’ microstructure is known to strongly evolve under the
action of an external stress. Figure 11 shows the successive microstructures
observed at different times during an uniaxial tensile creep test in the case of alloy
AM1. The y’ precipitates rapidly elongated perpendicular to the applied load. In
fact the direction of elongation depends on the sign of the misfit 6 and on the
sense of the stress. In the case of negative values of 6, the y’ platelets develop
perpendicular to an uniaxial tensile stress and parallel to a compressive one, the
situation being inverted in the case of a positive misfit.
Different theories have been proposed in order to explain this unusual
phenomena. They are generally based on the difference in the Young’s moduli of
the two phases, which are unfortunately difficult to measure. Although this
microstructural evolution was initially considered as structural damage, at this
time it is thought to be favorable, since it leads to the development of large y-y’
interfaces to retard dislocation motion. This is assumed to account for the low
secondary creep rate presented by these alloys at high temperature (see Figure
11).
It is thought that the efforts made to optimize the 7-Y’ microstructure are in
fact not so useful since this microstructure changes so rapidly in service. However
it is verified that the initial microstructure still has an influence on the high
 DIRECTIONALLY SOLIDIFIED MATERIALS 13

ligare 11 High temperature creep curve and associated evolution of the y’ morphology for alloy
AM1 (by courtesy of Fredholm, 1987).

temperature creep life of the material, in a way which is not fully understood. It is
advanced that the initial size distribution and spatial repartition of the precipitates
determine the degree of perfection of the 7-7’ lamellae and consequently the
hardening capability of the modified microstructure.

CONCLUSIONS
Although their importance is very limited in terms of produced quantity, the
materials used for manufacturing the turbine blades for aircraft engines are
strategic since the performances of these pieces directly limit the efficiency of the
engine. Their fast development during the last decades is a good illustration of a
successful collaboration between different scientific domains (fluids mechanics,
process engineering, structures modelisation, materials science etc...) owing to
the impulse of a strong industrial need. This research effort led to the design of
complex nickel base alloys which elaboration and manufacturing involve ad-
vanced processes and which final high temperature properties result from fine
thermal and chemical treatments. At this time single crystal nickel base
"superalloys" probably are the metallic materials which actually work under the
hardest chemical and thermomechanical conditions. However these materials are
now generally thought to have almost reached the highest level of their
capabilities. As the gas inlet temperature of the next generation of aircraft
engines are required to be several hundreds degrees above those of the current
ones, the nickel base alloys do not seem to be appropriate for these future
applications. Then research are already engaged in order to develop alternative
materials (oxyde dispersion strengthened materials, ceramics, composites...)
and to readapt the design of pieces and the manufacturing processes.
14 J. LACAZE AND A. HAZOTI’E

References
Bachelet, E. and Lesoult, G. (1978). Quality of Castings of Superalloys. Proceedings of a Conference
held in Liige "High Temperature Alloys for Gas Turbines" Edited by Coutsouradis et al., Applied
Science Publishers Ltd., pp. 665-699.
Caron, P. and Khan, T. (1983). Improvement of Creep Strength in a Nickel-base Single Crystal
Superalloy by Heat Treatment. Mat. Sci. and Eng., 61, 173-184.
Caron, P., Ohta, Y., Nagakawa, Y. G., Khan, T. (1988). Creep Deformation Anisotropy in Single
Crystal Superalloys. Proceedings of a Conference held in Seven Springs "Superalloys 88" Edited by
Duhl et al., published by The Metallurgical Society Inc., pp 215-224.
Elliott, R. (1983). Eutectic Solidification ProcessingCrystalline and Glassy Alloys. Butterworths
Monographs in Metals.
Flemings, M. C. (1974). Solidification Processing. Mac Graw Hill Book Company.
Fredholm, A. (1987). Monocristaux d’Alliages Base NickelRelation entre Composition, Microstruc-
ture et Comportement Mcanique Haute Temperature. Thesis, Ecole des Mines, Pads.
Herteman, J. P. (1985). The evolution of turbine blades materials. Mat6riaux et Techniques 559-556.
Kurz, W., Fisher, D. J. (1986). Fundamentals of Solidification. Trans. Tech. Publications.
Lacaze, J. (1987). Caractrisation de la Taille des Structures de Solidification Dirige. J. Micros.
Spectrosc. Electron. 12, 63-66.
McLean, M. (1983). Directionally solidified materials for high temperature service. Book n 296, The
Metals Society, London.
Sellamuthu, R., Brody, H. D., Giamei, A. F. (1986). Effect of Fluid Flow and Hafnium Content on
Macrosegregation in the Directional Solidification of Nickel Base Superalloys. Met. Trans. 1711,
347-356.
Sims, C. T. (1972). The Superalloys. Edited by C. T. Sims and W. C. HagelJohn Wiley Pub. New
York.
Sims, C. T. (1978). High Temperature Alloys in High-Technology Systems. Proceedings of a
Conference held in Liige "High Temperature Alloys for Gas Turbines" Edited by Coutsouradis et
al., Applied Science Publishers Ltd., pp. 13-65.
Rhys-Jones, T. N., Bettridge, D. F. (1987). Protective Coatings for Gas Turbines. Proceedings of the
First ASM Europe Technical Conference "Advanced Materials and Processing Techniques for
Structural Applications", Edited by Khan T. and Lasalmonie A., ONERA, pp. 129-158.
VerSnyder, F. L. (1982). Superalloy TechnologyToday and Tomorrow. Proceedings of a Con-
ferenee held in Liige "High Temperature Alloys for Gas Turbines 1982 Edited by Brunetaud et al.,
D. Reidel Publishing Company, pp. 1-49.
Zanghi, J.-P. (1988). Les Produits Mouls en Fonderie de Precision. In Solidification des Alliages-Du
Proc6d6 t la Microstructure. Edited by Durand F., Les Editions de Physique, 55-66.