Effects of simulation parameters on residual stresses of inconel alloy 600 in finite element laser shock peening analysis

Laser shock peening(LSP) is an innovative surface treatment technique, which is successfully applied to improve fatigue performance of metallic components. After the treatment, the fatigue strength and fatigue life of a metallic material can be increased remarkably owing to the presence of compressive residual stresses in the material. Recently, the incidences of cracking in Alloy 600 small-caliber penetration nozzles (CRDM (control rod drive mechanism) and BMI(bottom mounted instrument)) have increased significantly. The cracking mechanism has been attributed to primary water stress corrosion cracking (PWSCC) and has been shown to be driven by welding residual stresses and operational stresses in the weld region. For this reason, to mitigating weld residual stress, preventive maintenance of BMI nozzles was considered application of laser shock peening process. The present study is to predict the residual stresses distribution along the peening surface and the interior of the target (Inconel alloy 600 steel) induced by single and multiple LSP processes using the finite element method. The simulations were accomplished using a commercial finite element package ABAQUS, employing both explicit and implicit methodologies. Effects of parameters related to finite element simulation of laser shock peening process to determine compressive residual stresses of Inconel alloy 600 steel are discussed, in particular parameters associated with the LSP process, such as the maximum pressure, pressure pulse duration, laser spot size and number of shots. It is found that about 2HEL maximum pressure and a certain range of the pulse duration can produce maximum compressive residual stresses near the surface, and thus proper choices of these parameters are important. But plastically affected depth increase with increasing maximum pressure and pulse duration. For the laser spot size, residual stresses are not affected, provided it is larger than a certain size. Magnitudes of the compressive residual stresses and plastically affected depth are found to increase with increasing number of shots, but the effect is less pronounced for more shots. Thus, the amplitude of the initial tensile residual stresses was remarkably changed by LSP. Additionally, In order to evaluate the influence of initial residual stresses in Inconel alloy 600 steel, the initial condition option was employed in the finite element code.