Contrasting the Role of Pores on the Stress State Dependent Fracture Behavior of Additively Manufactured Low and High Ductility Metals

This study investigates the disparate impact of internal pores on the fracture behavior of two metal alloys fabricated via laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) additive manufacturing (AM)—316L stainless steel and Ti-6Al-4V. Data from mechanical tests over a range of stress states for dense samples and those with intentionally introduced penny-shaped pores of various diameters were used to contrast the combined impact of pore size and stress state on the fracture behavior of these two materials. The fracture data were used to calibrate and compare multiple fracture models (Mohr-Coulomb, Hosford-Coulomb, and maximum stress criteria), with results compared in equivalent stress (versus stress triaxiality and Lode angle) space, as well as in their conversions to equivalent strain space. For L-PBF 316L, the strain-based fracture models captured the stress state dependent failure behavior up to the largest pore size studied (2400 µm diameter, 16% cross-sectional area of gauge region), while for L-PBF Ti-6Al-4V, the stress-based fracture models better captured the change in failure behavior with pore size up to the largest pore size studied. This difference can be attributed to the relatively high ductility of 316L stainless steel, for which all samples underwent significant plastic deformation prior to failure, contrasted with the relatively low ductility of Ti-6Al-4V, for which, with increasing pore size, the displacement to failure was dominated by elastic deformation.