Microstructure Characteristics and Corrosion Resistance of Friction Stir Welded 2205 Duplex Stainless Steel

In this study, 2205 duplex stainless steel was friction-stir-welded at different welding speeds. The microstructural characteristics such as grain sizes, grain boundary misorientation angles, and phase contents in the stir zones of the joints were detected. The potentiodynamic polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy were also measured to evaluate the corrosion property of the stir zones. The effects of the microstructures on the corrosion property for friction-stir-welded 2205 duplex stainless steel were analyzed. The results indicated that the FSW process refined the grains and increased the ferrite contents in the stir zones. With increasing the welding speed from 30 mm/min to 50 mm/min, the grain size in the stir zone decreased from 1.64 μm to 0.96 μm, the ferrite content decreased from 59% to 54.4%, and the fractions of low angle grain boundaries for austenite and ferrite phases decreased from 63.9% and 92.6% to 18.0% and 41.1%, respectively. In this study, the effect of grain size on the corrosion resistance was the most significant and it was followed by the phase composition and the grain boundary misorientation angle. The stir zone obtained at 50 mm/min has the highest corrosion resistance, and it is followed by the base material and the stir zone obtained at 30 mm/min.