High creep strength, dispersion-strengthened iron aluminide prepared by multidirectional high-strain forging

A high-temperature forging technique was used to impart very high-strain to a cast iron aluminide containing a coarse distribution of borides. The resulting material retains a coarse grain size with a refined dispersion of fine boride particles. This material shows reasonable room temperature ductility with excellent creep strength up to temperatures >700 °C. The high-temperature strength is analysed by considering the material as a composite of hard cell walls and dispersion-strengthened near-cell regions, together with soft cell interiors.