Data compilation on the effect of grain size, temperature, and texture on the strength of a single-phase FCC MnFeNi medium-entropy alloy

This data article presents a compilation of microstructural and mechanical data regarding the ternary single-phase FCC MnFeNi medium-entropy alloy (MEA). For the analysis, interpretation, and comparison of the data to literature values, the reader can refer to the original related research article entitled “Effect of Temperature and Texture on Hall-Petch Strengthening by Grain and Annealing Twin Boundaries in the MnFeNi Medium-Entropy Alloy”, see Schneider et al. (Metals 9, 2019, 84). The microstructural data reported here include: (i) raw backscatter electron (BSE) micrographs (tif-files) obtained using a scanning electron microscope (SEM) for nine different grain sizes with four images for each grain size and (ii) pdf reports and tables shown below presenting the distributions of the grain- (d, accounting for grain boundaries only) and crystallite- (c, which accounts for both grain and annealing twin boundaries) sizes and of the annealing twin thicknesses (t). These datasets may be useful to develop new algorithms for the automated evaluation of microstructural parameters in recrystallized alloys, i.e. with these benchmark data, an algorithm for image analysis could be trained to assess the above mentioned microstructural parameters. This would help to speed up the analysis of microstructures and improve its reliability. Additional tables describing the recrystallized microstructures and texture include the average number of annealing twin boundaries per grain (n), and the average Taylor factors (M). Raeisinia et al. (Model. Simul. Mater. Sc. 16, 2008, 025001) recently used a viscoplastic model to show that differences in the distribution of microstructural parameters affect the Hall-Petch parameters, but no attempt has been carried out so far to experimentally investigate this possibility since grain size distributions are rarely reported. Here, our benchmark data (e.g. distribution in grain/crystallite sizes, annealing twins per grain, distribution of annealing twin thicknesses) could be used to address these issues. The data describing the mechanical properties reported here are excel-sheets of raw stress-strain curves for temperatures ranging from 77 K to 873 K and different grain sizes. The yield stress (σ(0.2%)) and the normalized Hall-Petch parameters (σ(0)/G and k(y)/Gb(2)) are given for all temperatures. The normalized Hall-Petch parameters are reported here since they allow to better compare the strength and the magnitude of grain boundary strengthening of different alloys with the same crystallographic structure, see Cordero et al. (Int. Mater. Rev. 61, 2016, 495–512). Moreover, the Hall-Petch parameters as well as the mechanical data reported here could be used for data mining and implemented in programs used for alloy design.