Development of Weld Metal Microstructures in Pulsed Laser Welding of Duplex Stainless Steel

The microstructure of the weld metal of a duplex stainless steel made with Nd:YAG pulsed laser is investigated at different travel speeds and pulse frequencies. In terms of the solidification pattern, the weld microstructure is shown to be composed of two distinct zones. The presence of two competing heat transfer channels to the relatively cooler base metal and the relatively hotter previous weld spot is proposed to develop two zones. At high overlapping factors, an array of continuous axial grains at the weld centerline is formed. At low overlapping factors, in the zone of higher cooling rate, a higher percentage of ferrite is transformed to austenite. This is shown to be because with extreme cooling rates involved in pulsed laser welding with low overlapping, the ferrite-to-austenite transformation can be limited only to the grain boundaries.