Effects of grain orientation on the Hall–Petch relationship in electrodeposited nickel with nanocrystalline grains

The effect of the distribution of grain orientations on the mechanical behaviour of nanostructured nickel samples obtained by electrodeposition is explored. The dependence of grain size on flow stress is accurately described by the Hall–Petch relationship over a large range of grain sizes (d > 20 nm). The Hall–Petch slope k depends on orientation texture in relation to the distribution of grain boundaries. The occurrence of two competing physical mechanisms, grain boundary shearing and dislocation emission at grain boundaries, is suggested to explain the experimental data.