Statistical analysis of EBSD data to predict potential abnormal grain growth in 3.0 wt% Si grain-oriented electrical steel

The role of grain topology as a predictor on abnormal grain growth (AGG) of primary recrystallized silicon steel sheet has been investigated by EBSD technique. Goss oriented grains in the primary recrystallized silicon steel sheet were observed to have larger grain sizes than average matrix grains. The average grain size of grains with the smallest deviation angle (< 1 degrees) from the Goss orientation was around 2.6 times larger than the average grain size of the matrix. Also, as the grain orientation approaches the Goss orientation, it had the higher number of neighboring grains. In this study, eight grains were identified as AGG candidates that have at least three times larger grain sizes than the average grain size, and have orientations close to the Goss orientation, i.e., with < 5 degrees deviation angle from Goss. However, it was not possible to determine which is more likely to happen for the abnormal grain growth among these grains.