In-house texture measurement using RIKEN accelerator-driven compact neutron source

Xu, P. G.   ; Takamura, Masato*; Ikeda, Yoshimasa*; Kakuta, Ryunosuke*; Iwamoto, Chihiro*; Hakoyama, Tomoyuki*; Otake, Yoshie*; Suzuki, Hiroshi  

Neutron diffraction is known as a powerful probe to determine the bulk averaged microstructural factors of metals and alloys. Compact neutron sources are being paid much attention for providing wide instrumental accessibility towards many potential on-site neutron diffraction applications, because of less technical complexity compared with large-scale neutron facilities. Here, the RIKEN Accelerator-Driven Compact Neutron Source (RANS) has been developed to establish the in-house technical environment of engineering diffraction for texture measurements. The measured texture of an interstitial-free (IF) steel sheet at RANS was found well consistent with the corresponding result obtained from a large-scale high-resolution time-of-flight neutron diffractometer. Such comparison suggests that RANS may be used to evaluate the ex situ texture characteristics of steel materials. Moreover, the increment of the output power and the addition of the neutron detector will be carried out in near future to enable rapid microstructural factor measurement of other high value-added metallic materials.