Indentation test and crystal plasticity analysis on mechanical properties of grain boundary

In this study, mechanical properties of grain boundary are evaluated by indentation tests at grain boundaries and grains consisting of the grain boundary. We find that maximum displacement of indenter at the grain boundary is different from the average of maximum displacement of the two grains. Moreover, we perform three-dimensional crystal plasticity FEM analyses on the indentation test and we discuss factors and mechanism on mechanical properties of grain boundary. Dislocation information is introduced into a hardening law of crystal in order to investigate the effect of dislocation behavior on the grain boundary. The load-displacement curves obtained by the crystal plasticity simulation predict that the maximum displacement of indenter at the grain boundary depends on crystal orientation and dislocation behavior. ©2015 The Society of Materials Science.