A unified constitutive approach for creep response of AISI 316 steel produced by conventional technologies or additive manufacturing techniques

The creep response of AISI 316 and AISI 316 L was analysed to provide a coherent picture of the material behaviour, valid for both conventional wrought and additively manufactured steels. Literature evidences were considered. The analysis demonstrated that the presence of a fine distribution of particles, precipitated during creep exposure in both AISI 316 and 316 L(N), should be taken into account. A recent model, expressly developed for particle-strengthened alloys, was successfully used to describe the minimum creep rate dependence on applied stress for AISI 316 and 316 L(N). The same set of constitutive equations, in combination with the composite model, was then used for describing creep data obtained by testing the AISI 316 L produced by additive manufacturing. The main difference with wrought materials was that the microstructure of the additively manufactured alloy was composed by cells (soft zones) and thick walls heavily decorated with ultrafine oxide particles (hard zones).