Numerical investigation of the surface and microstructure effects on the high cycle fatigue performance of additive manufactured stainless steel 316L

Abstract This paper aims to study the individual and competitive effects of surface defects and microstructural components in an AM 316L by numerical methods. Based on the microstructure sensitive modeling framework, numerical simulations of models in different surface states with virtual quasi-realistic explicit microstructures are performed. Problems encountered during the establishment of the numerical polycrystalline aggregate model are discussed, including the grain morphology, the strongly textured microstructure with preferential crystallographic directions, roughness and surface defect. A statistical method based on generalized extreme value distribution along with a non-local method is used to describe the stochasticity of microstructural attributes. Simulations of differently configured explicit microstructure models are analyzed and discussed.