scholarly journals Challenging Ultra Grain Refinement of Ferrite in Low-C Steel Only by Heat Treatment

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Myeong-heom Park ◽  
Akinobu Shibata ◽  
Nobuhiro Tsuji

It is well-known that grain refinement is one of the most effective ways to improve strength of metals without addition of alloying elements. In order to obtain bulky metals having ultrafine grained (UFG) microstructures with average grain sizes smaller than 1 μm, severe plastic deformation (SPD) processes have made a great success. However, there are still big barriers to realize UFG metallic materials, especially UFG steels, in large scale industries, since severe plastic deformation processes usually need special techniques and equipment, and large deformation forces are required for heavy plastic deformations. Cyclic heat treatments to repeat martensitic transformation and austenitization have been known as a simple way to fabricate fine-grained austenitic structures in steels. In the present study, we tried to make final ferrite microstructures ultrafine in a low-C steel by means of the cyclic heat treatment. Evolution of microstructures during the cyclic heat treatment was systematically investigated, putting stress on the change of grain sizes of austenite and ferrite. The austenite grain size decreased with increasing the number of heat treatment cycles, and the minimum average austenite grain size obtained was 11 μm. By having furnace-cooling from austenite states with various grain sizes, ferrite microstructures with different mean grain sizes were fabricated. We could successfully obtain a fine-grained ferrite structure with a mean grain size of 4.5 μm and nearly a random texture through the heat treatment without deformation. Microstructural features and mechanical properties of the obtained fine-grained ferritic structures were investigated by scanning electron microscope/electron back-scattering diffraction measurements and a tensile test at room temperature. The specimens with ferrite + pearlite microstructure with the smallest average ferrite grain size of 4.5 μm managed both high strength (yield strength of 375 MPa and tensile strength of 500 MPa) and large tensile ductility (uniform elongation of 20% and total elongation of 39%) in the simple 2Mn-0.1C steel.

2013 ◽  
Vol 813 ◽  
pp. 116-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kazuaki Nakane ◽  
Katsuyuki Kida ◽  
Koshiro Mizobe

Here, we introduce the mathematical methods to quantitatively evaluate the change of the tissue to quenching. SAE 52100 sample was repeatedly quenched and the influence of this cyclic heat treatment was investigated. The repeated quenching process increased the retained austenite content and had little influence on the materials hardness. The prior austenite grain size was decreased and consequently, refinement of the martensitic phase in the material occurred. The higher content of the retained austenite (higher fracture toughness) and the refinement of the microstructure accounted for the higher fatigue properties of the repeatedly quenched material. Here we use mathematical homology to quantify these features.


2016 ◽  
Vol 838-839 ◽  
pp. 440-444
Author(s):  
Xiang Wei Kong ◽  
Tian Zhong Sui ◽  
Zhi Yong Hu

The effect of hot deformation behavior on austenite grain size refinement of low carbon multi-microalloyed steel was investigated. The morphology of austenite grains was revealed by thermal etching and observed using optical microscope. The results showed that single pass compression can only marginally refine austenite grain size by dynamic recrystallization, even under severe plastic deformation. However, when the specimens were held for a while after hot deformation, the fine austenite grain size can be obtained due to static recrystallization behavior.


Metals ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 324
Author(s):  
David San-Martin ◽  
Matthias Kuntz ◽  
Francisca G. Caballero ◽  
Carlos Garcia-Mateo

This investigation explores the influence of the austenitisation heat treatment and thus, of the prior austenite grain size (PAGS), on the kinetics of the bainitic transformation, using as A case study two high-carbon, high-silicon, bainitic steels isothermally transformed (TIso = 250, 300, 350 °C), after being austenised at different temperatures (γTγ = 925–1125 °C). A methodology, based on the three defining dilatometric parameters extracted from the derivative of the relative change in length, was proposed to analyse the transformation kinetics. These parameters are related to the time to start bainitic transformation, the time lapse for most of the transformation to take place and the transformation rate at the end of the transformation. The results show that increasing the PAGS up to 70 µm leads to an increase in the bainite nucleation rate, this effect being more pronounced for the lowest TIso. However, the overall transformation kinetics seems to be weakly affected by the applied heat treatment (γTγ and TIso). In one of the steels, PAGS > 70 µm (γTγ > 1050 °C), which weakly affects the progress of the transformation, except for TIso = 250 °C, for which the enhancement of the autocatalytic effect could be the reason behind an acceleration of the overall transformation.


Materials ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 15
Author(s):  
Łukasz Poloczek ◽  
Łukasz Rauch ◽  
Marek Wilkus ◽  
Daniel Bachniak ◽  
Władysław Zalecki ◽  
...  

The paper describes physical and numerical simulations of a manufacturing process composed of hot forging and controlled cooling, which replace the conventional heat treatment technology. The objective was to investigate possibilities and limitations of the heat treatment with the use of the heat of forging. Three steels used to manufacture automotive parts were investigated. Experiments were composed of two sets of tests. The first were isothermal (TTT) and constant cooling rate (CCT) dilatometric tests, which supplied data for the identification of the numerical phase transformation model. The second was a physical simulation of the sequence forging-cooling on Gleeble 3800, which supplied data for the validation of the models. In the numerical part, a finite element (FE) thermal-mechanical code was combined with metallurgical models describing recrystallization and grain growth during forging and phase transformations during cooling. The FE model predicted distributions of the temperature and the austenite grain size in the forging, which were input data for further simulations of phase transformations during cooling. A modified JMAK equation was used to calculate the kinetics of transformation and volume fraction of microstructural constituents after cooling. Since the dilatometric tests were performed for various austenitization temperatures before cooling, it was possible to include austenite grain size as a variable in the model. An inverse algorithm developed by the authors was applied in the identification procedure. The model with optimal material parameters was used for simulations of hot forging and controlled cooling in one of the forging shops in Poland. Distributions of microstructural constituents in the forging after cooling were calculated. As a consequence, various cooling sequences during heat treatment could be analyzed and compared.


2002 ◽  
Vol 329-331 ◽  
pp. 118-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.N. Wang ◽  
Jie Yang ◽  
Qiangfei Xia ◽  
Yong Wang

Metals ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 577 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Härtel ◽  
Birgit Awiszus ◽  
Marcel Graf ◽  
Alexander Nitsche ◽  
Marcus Böhme ◽  
...  

This paper examines how the initial austenite grain size in quench and partitioning (Q-P) processes influences the final mechanical properties of Q-P steels. Differences in austenite grain size distribution may result, for example, from uneven heating rates of semi-finished products prior to a forging process. In order to quantify this influence, a carefully defined heat treatment of a cylindrical specimen made of the Q-P-capable 42SiCr steel was performed in a dilatometer. Different austenite grain sizes were adjusted by a pre-treatment before the actual Q-P process. The resulting mechanical properties were determined using the upsetting test and the corresponding microstructures were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). These investigations show that a larger austenite grain size prior to Q-P processing leads to a slightly lower strength as well as to a coarser martensitic microstructure in the Q-P-treated material.


MRS Advances ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (12) ◽  
pp. 811-816 ◽  
Author(s):  
Myeong-heom Park ◽  
Akinobu Shibata ◽  
Nobuhiro Tsuji

ABSTRACTIt is well-known that dual phase (DP) steels composed of ferrite and martensite have good ductility and plasticity as well as high strength. Due to their excellent mechanical properties, DP steels are widely used in the industrial field. The mechanical properties of DP steels strongly depend on several factors such as fraction, distribution and grain size of each phase. In this study, the grain size effect on mechanical properties of DP steels was investigated. In order to obtain DP structures with different grain sizes, intercritical heat treatment in ferrite + austenite two-phase region was carried out for ferrite-pearlite structures having coarse and fine ferrite grain sizes. These ferrite-pearlite structures with coarse and fine grains were fabricated by two types of heat treatments; austenitizing heat treatment and repetitive heat treatment. Ferrite grain sizes of the specimens heat-treated by austenitizing and repetitive heat treatment were 47.5 µm (coarse grain) and 4.5 µm (fine grain), respectively. The ferrite grain sizes in the final DP structures fabricated from the coarse-grained and fine-grained ferrite-pearlite structures were 58.3 µm and 4.1µm, respectively. The mechanical behavior of the DP structures with different grain sizes was evaluated by an uniaxial tensile test at room temperature. The local strain distribution in the specimens during tensile test was obtained by a digital image correlation (DIC) technique. Results of the tensile test showed that the fine-grained DP structure had higher strength and larger elongation than the coarse-grained DP structure. It was found by the DIC analysis that the fine-grained DP structure showed homogeneous deformation compared with the coarse-grained DP structure.


2012 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 877-881 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Wawer ◽  
M. Lewandowska ◽  
K.J. Kurzydłowski

In the present study, severe plastic deformation (SPD) processing was combined with pre- and post processing heat treatment to investigate the possibility of synergic grain size and precipitation strengthening. Samples of 7475 alloy were solution heat treated and water quenched prior to hydrostatic extrusion (HE) which resulted in a grain refinement by 3 orders of magnitude, from 70 μm to about 70 nm. The extruded samples were subsequently aged at temperatures resulting in formation of nanoprecipitates.


Author(s):  
Jwala Sudheer Reddy ◽  
U. Mahaboob Basha ◽  
L. Balasubramanyam ◽  
S. Jithendra Naik

Severe plastic deformation (SPD) Processes is to be determined as metal forming processes in which a very large plastic strain is imposed on a bulk process in which to make an ultra-fine-grained metal. Generating an ultrafine grained metal is to allow lightweight parts by using high strength metal for the safety and reliability of micro-parts and for eco-friendly, is the main intention of SPD Processes. In Severe plastic deformation processes (SPD), repetitive corrugation and straightening (RCS) are one of the new technical processes, in which the grain size is reduced to ultrafine grain size then the strength of copper is going to be increased by using this process in this project. The Taguchi optimization technique is utilized with conventional orthogonal array L9, in which to determine the process parameters are statistically significant on hardness. Finally, the verification test was carried out to investigate optimization enhancements.


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