While FeAl is a B2 alloy, the observed yield strength anomaly in FeAl is due to another mechanism. If cross-slip were the mechanism, then the yield strength anomaly would be rate dependent, as expected for a thermally activated process. Instead, yield strength anomaly is state dependent, which is a property that is dependent on the state of the material. As a result, vacancy activated strengthening is the most widely-accepted mechanism. The vacancy formation energy is low for FeAl, allowing for an unusually high concentration of vacancies in FeAl at high temperatures (2.5% at 1000C for Fe-50Al). The vacancy formed in either aluminum-rich FeAl or through heating is an aluminum vacancy.
At low temperatures around 300K, the yield strength either decreases or does not change with temperature. At moderate temperatures (0.35-0.45 T), yield strength has been observed to increase with an increased vacancy concentration, providing further evidence for a vacancy driven strengthening mechanism. The increase in yield strength from increased vacancy concentration is believed to be the result of dislocations being pinned by vacancies on the slip plane, causing the dislocations to bow. Then, above the peak stress temperature, vacancies can migrate as vacancy migration is easier with elevated temperatures. At those temperatures, vacancies no longer hinder dislocation motion but rather aid climb. In the vacancy strengthening model, the increased strength below the peak stress temperature is approximated as proportional to the vacancy concentration to the one-half with the vacancy concentration estimated using Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics. Thus, the strength can be estimated as , with  being the vacancy formation energy and T being the absolute temperature. Above the peak stress temperature, a diffusion-assisted deformation mechanism can be used to describe strength since vacancies are now mobile and assist dislocation motion. Above the peak, the yield strength is strain rate dependent and thus, the peak yield strength is rate dependent. As a result, the peak stress temperature increases with an increased strain rate. Note, this is different than the yield strength anomaly, which is the yield strength below the peak, being rate dependent. The peak yield strength is also dependent on percent aluminum in the FeAl alloy. As the percent aluminum increases, the peak yield strength occurs at lower temperatures.
The yield strength anomaly in FeAl alloys can be hidden if thermal vacancies are not minimized through a slow anneal at a relatively low temperature (~400 °C for ~5 days). Further, the yield strength anomaly is not present in systems that use a very low strain rate as the peak yield strength is strain rate dependent and thus, would occur at temperatures too low to observe the yield strength anomaly. Additionally, since the formation of vacancies requires time, the peak yield strength magnitude is dependent on how long the material is held at the peak stress temperature. Also, the peak yield strength has been found not to be dependent on crystal orientation.
Other mechanisms have been proposed including a cross slip mechanism similar to that for L1, dislocation decomposition into less mobile segments at jogs, dislocation pinning, climb-lock mechanism, and slip vector transition. The slip vector transition from MnAl is not dependent on strain rate and thus, may not follow the vacancy activated strengthening mechanism. Instead, there an order-strengthening mechanism has been proposed.