SLIP BY DISLOCATION

MOVEMENT
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
• Consider that plastic deformation is the
transition from an unslipped state to a slipped
• the process is opposed by an energy barrier ∆E
• the slipped material will grow at the expense of
the unslipped region by an advance of an
interfacial region
• the interfacial region is a dislocation.
• To minimise the energy for the transition, we
expect the interface thickness w to be narrow
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
• The distance w is the width of the dislocation
• The smaller the width of the dislocation, the
lower is the interfacial energy,
• But the wider the dislocation, the lower is the
elastic energy of the crystal because then the
atomic spacing in the slip direction is closer to
its equilibrium spacing.
• The equilibrium width of the dislocation is
determined by a balance between these
opposing energy changes.
SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
• The dislocation width is important because it
determines the force required to move a
dislocation through the crystal lattice
• This force is called the Peierls-Nabarro force.
• The Peierls stress is the shear stress required
to move a dislocation through a crystal lattice
in a particular direction
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL

• Where a is the distance between slip planes and b is the

distance between atoms in a slip direction.
• Note that the dislocation width appears in the exponential
term so that the Peielrs stress will be sensitive to the
atomic position at the core of the dislocation.
• The equation is accurate enough to show that the stress
required to move a dislocation in a metal is quite low.
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
• materials with wide dislocations will require a low stress to move the
dislocation.
• Physically this is so because when the dislocation is wide, the highly
distorted region at the core of the dislocation is not localized on any
particular atom in the crystal lattice.
• In ductile materials, the dislocation width is of the order of 10 atomic
spacings .
• However, in ceramic materials with directional covalent bonds, the
interfacial energy is high and the dislocations are narrow and
relatively immobile.
• This fact combined with the restriction on the slip systems imposed by
the requirements of electrostatic forces result in the low degree of
plasticity of ceramic materials.
• Ceramics become more ductile at high temperatures because thermal
activation helps the dislocations overcome the energy barrier.
 SLIP BY DISLOCATION MOVEMENT -
COTTRELL
• The fact that slip occurs in close packed directions (b) is
minimized),the Peierls stress will be lower.
• If a<b, as would occur for closely spaced but loosely
packed planes, the Peierls stress would be high.
• Thus the equation provides a basis for the observation
that slip occurs most readily on close packed planes in
the close packed directions.
• When the crystal structure is complex without highly
closely packed planes and directions, the dislocations
tend to be immobile.
• This causes the brittleness and high hardness of
intermetallic compounds.
SHEAR STRAIN
SHEAR STRAIN
• consider the case where a dislocation has moved
part way through the crystal along the slip plane.
Since b is very small compare to L or h,