International audienceAt elevated temperature (550°C) intergranular creep cracks have been observed in thermally and environmentally aged 316H stainless steel. To improve the understanding of mechanisms responsible of creep cracking, micromechanical experiments are proposed. An identification procedure of the crack tip position based on kinematic measurements is presented. Finite element simulations of intergranular cracks in bycristals have been performed and used as test fields to deform experimental images and to validate the image processing used for the identification

Latourte, Félix

Muracciole, Jean-Michel

Podesta, Laurie

Waltz, Laurent

Wattrisse, Bertrand

English

Hal-Diderot

Intergranular creep crack monitoring in 316H using Digital Image Correlation

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Intergranular creep crack monitoring in 316H using
Digital Image Correlation
Laurie Podesta, Bertrand Wattrisse, Félix Latourte, Laurent Waltz,
Jean-Michel Muracciole
To cite this version:
Laurie Podesta, Bertrand Wattrisse, Félix Latourte, Laurent Waltz, Jean-Michel Muracciole. Inter-
granular creep crack monitoring in 316H using Digital Image Correlation. Photomechanics 2015, May
2015, Delft, Netherlands. ￿hal-02080418￿
INTERGRANULAR CREEP CRACK MONITORING IN 316H USING DIGITAL IMAGE CORRELATION 
 
L. Podesta
1,2
, B. Wattrisse
1
, F. Latourte
2
 L. Waltz
1
, and J.-M. Muracciole
1
 
1
LMGC-ThM2, Université de Montpellier/UMR5508, CC048 Place Eugène Bataillon, 34095 Montpellier Cedex 
5, France 
 
   
 2 
EDF R&D, Site des Renardières, Avenue des Renardières-Ecuelles, 77818 Moret-sur-Loing, France  
laurie.podesta@edf.fr 
 
 
ABSTRACT: At elevated temperature (550°C) intergranular creep cracks have been observed in thermally and 
environmentally aged 316H stainless steel. To improve the understanding of mechanisms responsible of creep cracking, 
micromechanical experiments are proposed. An identification procedure of the crack tip position based on kinematic 
measurements is presented. Finite element simulations of intergranular cracks in bycristals have been performed and used 
as test fields to deform experimental images and to validate the image processing used for the identification. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
 Since the 1980‘s, Digital Image Correlation (DIC) has been widely applied to study the deformation of materials [1] 
and to identify their behaviour. In parallel, significant advances have been made in microscopic image acquisition, 
especially in Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). The high resolution images acquired by microscopy can potentially be 
utilized to improve our understanding of crack incubation, initiation and growth in polycrystals. The DIC algorithms require 
spatially dense information and rely on local grayscale variations provided in our work by a surface deposition technique. A 
specific pattern was optimally designed for creep cracking characterization. 
 A phenomenological crystal plasticity law has been chosen to describe the plastic response of the 316H at the 
grain scale. This law was initially proposed by Méric and Cailletaud [2] and has already been validated for cyclic loadings in 
austenitic stainless steels [3]. Crystal plasticity laws are also relevant to model crystal creep deformation, for example on 
Ni-based single crystals [4] or in polycrystalline Ti-based alloys such as Ta6V [5]. 
 At high temperature one of the most detrimental damage mechanism during creep is intergranular cracking. The 
aim of this paper is to propose and to validate a procedure allowing the monitoring of creep crack growth. The method is 
based on the analysis of kinematic fields obtained by Digital Image Correlation during in-situ elastic loading, at different 
steps of a conventional interrupted creep experiment. 
 The method is briefly described in the first paragraph. It is then validated on real images deformed by a known 
displacement field associated with the development of a crack either for a linear or non-linear behaviour, allowing a 
metrological characterization of the procedure.  
2. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE 
Single Edge Notched Tensile specimens (SENT) will be submitted to interrupted microcreep tests and will be 
studied using SEM observations. By comparing SEM images of the unloaded specimen collected at different creep levels 
the plastic strains will be monitored at the microstructural scale. In addition, for each creep interruption, an in-situ loading 
device will be used to elastically deform the specimen. Combining this with an identification procedure similar to that 
proposed in [6], the crack tip position will be located. 
3. KINEMATIC MEASUREMENT METHOD 
We use a specific DIC formulation designated as “E-Kin” for Enriched Kinematics. It is based on a mesh 
discretization, as in the global approach discussed in [7]. The difference in this approach lies in the description of the 
kinematic fields where continuity conditions between the mesh elements can be adjusted. For example, the local approach 
can be retrieved when no continuity conditions are chosen, while normal and tangential displacement continuity can be 
introduced in the kinematics as in global methods. 
The DIC formulation is based on texture conservation (Eq.1), where f(x) and g(x) are the reference and deformed 
images, respectively, and u is the unknown displacement field (generally taken as a low order spatial polynomial):  
 
                   1) 
 
Regarding local approaches, the texture conservation is generally considered in a least square sense on a given surface 
(the subset), leading to the introduction of the SSD (Sum of Squared Difference) criterion. The minimization of this criterion 
with respect to the introduced polynomial coefficients allows determining the local displacement field in the neighborhood 
of the subset. The minimization is performed separately onto each subset.  
Firstly introduced in [8], the E-Kin approach allows introducing kinematical restrictions (continuity or jumps) between two 
adjacent subsets. When dealing with polynomial shape functions, these restrictions correspond to linear equations 
between the coefficients of the involved subsets. These equations act as constraints in the minimization of the correlation 
criterion. 
Using a microlithography technique, a computer-designed pattern is deposited at the specimen surface, and 
consists in a combination of 10μm-step grid and of a random speckle pattern within each area (see Fig. 1a).This 
double-scale pattern is proposed to optimize the description of the strain gradients. The chosen mesh for the E-Kin 
approach can be adjusted to this pattern by sake of consistency. In the example provided on Fig. 2c. it is made of 
quadrangles with a size of 30 pixels or 10μm. 
 
 
(a) (b) 
Figure 1- A possibility of mesh discretization used in the E-Kin correlation procedure (a) - Reference SEM image 
of the DIC pattern obtained experimentally and deformed using the computed displacement fields (b). The scale 
bar is 100μm in length. 
4. VALIDATION OF THE DIC MEASUREMENT 
The aim of this work is to assess the ability of different DIC approaches to precisely estimate the location of an 
inter-granular crack in different situations (e.g. elastic or plastic opening). In this paper, two error sources are addressed: 
the crack shape identification by DIC and the experimental errors related to the cumulated errors in the image acquisition 
chain: distortions [9], parallax errors, pattern evolution… In the following, we first present a numerical validation of the 
displacement field measurements associated with cracking. Then experimental errors are characterized through an 
experimental preliminary assessment involving re-positioning and pattern degradation. 
 
4.1. Numerical validation 
The numerical validation is performed using trial displacement fields computed using a reference displacement 
field obtained by a direct finite element calculation Code_Aster. An elastic isotropic behaviour is chosen. The crack position 
is perfectly known and uniform (planar) boundary conditions in displacement are used to load the 60mm-height structure, 
using a combination of modes I and II. The displacement fields obtained in mode I for an imposed vertical elongation of 0.4 
mm are shown in Figure 2a. An experimental image obtained by SEM and shown in Figure 1a is then deformed using Gmic 
software [10] in accordance with the FE displacement field. The obtained deformed image is given in Figure 1b. This set of 
images is used to compare the efficiency of Local and E-Kin DIC methods. The Figure 2b 2c illustrate the measured 
displacement fields from which the crack position can be determined. 
 
(a) 
 
(b) 
 
(c) 
Figure 2- Vertical component of the displacement fields computed using Code_Aster (a), Local approach (b) and 
E-Kin approach with a horizontal mesh (c). 
 
 
4.2. Experimental validations 
 In this section, we focus on errors that may arise from re-positioning of the specimen and the pattern damage due to 
oxidation at high temperature, both being related to our experimental procedure. 
 Re-positioning errors were addressed by capturing two SEM images separated by a specimen unmounting and 
remounting in the SEM holder, and performing the DIC (see Fig.3). To minimize errors, most of the SEM imaging 
parameters was kept constant for the two images acquisitions. The measured displacement is the combination of a rigid 
body motion (displacement of the specimen) and of a localized deformation appearing as deformation band (amplitude: 
0.005) (see Fig.4). 
The creep experimental conditions (550°C in air) lead to oxide growth at the specimen surface. This oxide may 
change the quality of the pattern (contrast, heterogeneous oxidation, stains, etc…). A sample made of 316H covered with a 
tungsten pattern has been placed in a furnace during two weeks in the previously described environment (see Fig.5). The 
corresponding displacement field is illustrated in Fig. 5.c and 5.d. It corresponds to a rather homogeneous deformation. 
 
 
(a) (b) 
Figure 3- Displacement fields associated with repositioning in the horizontal (a) and vertical (b) direction, 
obtained with the local approach after an in and out way in the SEM chamber. 
 
(a) (b) 
(c) (d) 
Figure 5- SEM images in BSE (Back Scattered Electron) Z contrast mode before (a) and after (b) ageing in air 
corresponding displacement fields in the horizontal (c) and vertical (d) direction, obtained with the local 
approach. 
(a) 
 
 (b) 
 
(c) 
Figure 4- Strain fields obtained in the displacement fields of Fig. 3 in the horizontal (a), vertical (b) and in-plane 
shear components (c) directions with the local approach. 
5. CONCLUSION AND PERSPECTIVES 
At elevated temperature (550°C) intergranular creep cracks can potentially occur in thermally and environmentally 
aged 316H stainless steel. An identification procedure of the crack tip position based on kinematic measurements has 
been introduced (E-Kin). Its performance has been assessed using deformed images numerically built from displacement 
fields obtained by Code_Aster finite element simulations. An elastic isotropic behaviour and uniform boundary conditions in 
displacement are chosen. The displacement fields resulting from the loading of the structure have been used to deform an 
experimental SEM image. Based on the reference image, a mesh discretization relevant with the deposited pattern has 
been carried out. An explicit mesh of the crack allows capturing the displacement field in the cracked domain.  
The SEM observations of the creep samples lead to a re-positioning procedure of the sample in the SEM. The 
measurement errors due to unintentional variations in the SEM imaging settings such as magnitfication evolution have 
been estimated. 
Further improvements related to the choice of the mesh element shape functions will be performed to better 
describe the kinematics in front of the crack and to locate the crack tip precisely. The effect of the environment (air at 
550°C) on the DIC pattern conservation has been investigated. The surface preparation technique is still being improved to 
better fulfil the optical flow conservation hypothesis, while specific DIC criterions tolerant with pattern evolution at high 
temperature will be tested. 
6. REFERENCES 
[1] Sutton, M.A. and Wolters, W.J. and Peters, W.H. and Ranson, W.F. and McNeill, S.R. (1983) Determination of 
displacements using an improved digital correlation method. Image and vision computing 1, 133-139 
[2] Méric, L. and Poubanne, P. and Cailletaud, G. (1991). Single crystal modelling for structural calculations: I model 
presentation. J. of Eng. Mat and Tech. Trans of the ASME 113, 162-170 
[3] Guilhem, Y. and Basseville, S. and Curtit, F. and Stephan, J-M. and Cailletaud, G. (2013) Numerical investigations of 
the free surface effect in three dimensional polycrystalline aggregates. Computational Materials Science 70, 150-162 
[4] Samal, M.K. and Ghosh, S. (2013) Evaluation of creep deformation and mechanical properties of Nickel-based 
superalloys through FE analysis based on crystal plasticity models. Proc. Engineering 55, 342-347 
[5] Hasija, V. and Ghosh, S. and Mills, M.J. and Joseph, D.S. (2003) Deformation and creep modelling in polycrystalline 
Ti-6Al alloys. Act. Materialia 51, 4533-4549 
[6] Hild, F. and Roux, S. (2006) Measuring stress intensity factors with a camera: Integrated digital image correlation 
(I-DIC) Comptes Rendus Mécanique 334, 8-12 
[7] Hild, F. and Roux, S. (2012) Comparison of local and global approaches to digital image correlation. Experimental 
mechanics 52, 1503-1519 
[8] Li L. (2014) Caractérisation et identification du comportement thermomécanique de multi-cristaux d’aluminium Thèse 
de doctorat, Université Montpellier 2. 
[9] Guery, A. and Latourte, F. and Hild, F. and Roux, S. (2013) Characterization of SEM speckle pattern marking and 
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[10] GMIC web site: gmic.sourceforge.net  
 


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