Tensile Properties of Selective Laser Melted 316L Stainless Steel

Selective laser melting (SLM), as the most common additive manufacturing (AM) method, is capable of manufacturing metallic components with complex shape layer by layer. Compared with conventional manufacturing technologies such as casting or forging, the SLM technology has the advantages of high degree accuracy, high material utilization rate and environmentally friendly, and has attracted great attention in the fields of aerospace, nuclear power and medicine. The 316L austenitic stainless steel is widely used in the industrial field because of the excellent corrosion resistance and plasticity. It is also one of the commonly used material systems for SLM. In this work, the tensile properties and fracture mechanism of 316L stainless steel fabricated via SLM technology were investigated. The microstructure of the SLMed 316L specimens after tensile fracture was characterized and analyzed. The results show that the SLMed 316L stainless steel has a relatively desirable combination of strength and ductility, and its tensile performance is obviously better than that of 316L stainless steel prepared by traditional methods. The nanometer-scale cell structure inside the grain contributes to the improvement of strength. Deformation twins were observed in the SLMed 316L stainless steel after tensile test. The appearance of twins is oriented-dependent, and it is easy to occur in the grain with the direction near < 110 >-< 111 >.