Misorientations across interfaces in spark plasma–sintered WC–Co cemented carbides

This interdisciplinary work concerns misorientations across various interfaces in spark plasma–sintered (SPSed) WC–Co cemented carbides, as well as how these misorientations affect the intergranular fracture. The whole boundaries in cemented carbides were divided according to the phases on the two sides of the boundary plane, and carbide/carbide grain boundaries were further divided according to the misorientation across the boundary plane. Stereological statistics and five-parameter analysis were comprehensively performed on the concerned boundary types. For Σ2 carbide/carbide boundaries, multiple boundary structures are observed. How Σ2 twist inhibits intergranular fracture and how such boundary structure is formed are analyzed. For random carbide/carbide boundaries, the habit planes that they are terminated by are calibrated, and their responses to intergranular fracture are examined according to their energy anisotropy. For WC/α-cobalt and WC/β-cobalt phase boundaries, misorientations across these boundary planes and the corresponding crack propagation routines are illustrated. On these bases, approaches to improve the fracture strength of SPSed cemented carbides are suggested.