Application of Orientation Microscopy in SEM and TEM for the Study of Texture Formation during Recrystallisation Processes

Orientation microscopy in TEM and SEM is a particularly well suited tool to study recrystallisation processes because these are always associated with orientation and microstructure changes. The present work discusses the possibilities and limits of the TEM and SEM based techniques and illustrates their use by means of 3 different examples. The examples include studies on nucleation mechanisms of primary recrystallisation where the techniques meet their limits in spatial resolution. The problem of in-situ observations of annealing processes is discussed and it is shown how recrystallisation simulation techniques based on experimental data may be used. Furthermore the new technique of 3-dimensional EBSD in a focused-ion-beam (FIB) SEM is presented with one example. Finally, the statistical analysis of very large orientation data sets is discussed by an example of secondary recrystallisation in electrical steels.