Surface study of laser welded stainless steels using secondary ion mass spectrometry Available to Purchase

A very high cooling rate, of the order of million degrees per second, results in rapid solidification of the liquid pool during laser welding. The study of the surface and concentration profiles of various alloying elements and gaseous impurities in this layer can provide information about mass transfer and element vaporization which takes place during laser welding. Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS), which has the broadest capability to study both the surface and depth profiles, was used to investigate the profiles of different elements, isotopes and gases on the surface and in the bulk of a rapidly solidified laser welded AISI 200 series stainless steel. A CAMECA, IMS-3F, ion microprobe was utilized for this purpose. The effect of using different primary ion beams, such as cesium and oxygen, their limitations, advantages and correlation are presented in detail in this paper.