Effect of Au-ions irradiation on microstructure and mechanical properties of FeCrAl coating

Six kinds of FeCrAl coatings with different Cr and Al contents were irradiated by 6 MeV Au -ions with a damage level of 20 dpa. The results showed that the surface roughness and grain size of the coatings increased significantly after irradiation. Nanoscale precipitation and irradiation-induced twins appeared in the coating with relatively lower Cr content. The increase of Cr content promotes the transformation from irradiation-induced softening to hardening. Changed Al content can cause the change in hardness, but cannot cause the transition of softening and hardening. The underlying evolution mechanism of microstructure and mechanical properties induced by Au-ions irradiation is discussed.& COPY; 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).