Influence of Ca treatment on particle-microstructure relationship in heat-affected zone of shipbuilding steel with Zr-Ti deoxidation after high-heat-input welding

The effects of Ca treatment on the particle, microstructure, and toughness of heat-affected zone (HAZ) of shipbuilding steel with Zr-Ti deoxidation after high-heat-input welding were investigated. The simulated welding at a high-heat-input welding of 200 kJ/cm was carried out using Gleeble-3800 welding simulation. Then, particle characteristics were characterized using an Aztec-Feature automatic particle analysis system. Additionally, an in-situ observation experiment was performed to study the relationships between particle and microstructure by high-temperature confocal laser scanning microscopy (HT-CLSM). The results indicated that the average HAZ toughness at -40 degrees C was increased from 183 to 290 J by adding 0.0026 wt.% Ca. Meanwhile, the formation of acicular ferrite ratio was increased from 49.34% to 60.28% due to the addition of Ca. The scanning electron microscopy results clearly showed that CaO-Al2O3-TiOx-ZrO2-MnS particles could act as effective nucleation sites for the formation of acicular ferrite, which has been verified by the observation of the particle-microstructure relationship under HT-CLSM. Furthermore, particle characterization results show that the cumulative frequency of particles with the size of 1-3 mu m was 33.2% in HAZ of Zr-Ti shipbuilding steel but 66.2% in HAZ of Zr-Ti-Ca shipbuilding steel.