Effect of oxygen on weld shape and crystallographic orientation of duplex stainless steel weld using advanced A-TIG (AA-TIG) welding method

The double-shielded advanced A-TIG (AA-TIG) welding method was adopted in this study for the welding of the SUS329J4L duplex stainless steel with the shielding gases of different oxygen content levels. The oxygen content in the shielding gas was controlled by altering the oxygen content in the outer layer gas, while the inner layer remained pure argon to suppress oxidation on the tungsten electrode. As a result, a deep weld penetration was obtained due to the dissolution of oxygen into the weld metals. Additionally, the microstructure of the weld metal was changed by the dissolution of oxygen. The austenite phase at the ferrite grain boundary followed a Kurdjumov-Sachs (K-S) orientation relationship with the ferrite matrix phase at any oxide content. On the other hand, the orientation relationship between the intragranular austenite phase and the ferrite matrix phase exhibited different patterns under different oxygen content levels. When there was little oxide in the fusion zone, only a limited part of the intragranular austenite phase and the ferrite matrix phase followed the K-S orientation relationship. With the increase of the oxide, the correspondence of the K-S relationship increased and fit very well in the 2.5% O2 shielded sample. The investigation of this phenomenon was carried out along with the nucleation mechanisms of the intragranular austenite phases.