Heat Treatment of steels

Introduction
Metals and alloys may not posses all the desired properties in the finished product. Alloying and Heat treatment are two methods which are extensively used for controlling material properties. Heat Treating defined as the controlled heating and cooling of metals and alloys for the primary purpose of altering their properties (strength, ductility, hardness, toughness, machinability, etc) Can be done for Strengthening Purposes (converting structure to martensite)

Can be done for Softening and Conditioning Purposes (annealing, tempering, etc.)

MATERIALS TETRAHEDRON

2003 Brooks/Cole Publishing / Thomson Learning

Composition means the chemical make-up of a material. Structure means a description of the arrangements of atoms or ions in a material. Synthesis is the process by which materials are made from naturally occurring or other chemicals. Processing means different ways for shaping materials into useful components or changing their properties.

 In heat treatment, the microstructures of materials are modified. The resulting phase transformation influences mechanical properties like strength, ductility, toughness, hardness and wear resistance.

Purpose of heat treatment is to increase service life of a product by increasing its strength of hardness, or prepare the material for improved manufacturability

Basic review of Metallurgy

Little impact on strength Alloying and heat treating

Greatest impact on strength and ductility!!

Course GB = weak, Fine GB = strong and ductile

Defects in crystals. (a) Vacanciesmissing atoms. (b) Foreign (solute) atom on interstitial and substitutional sites. (c) Line Defect = A dislocationan extra half-plane of atoms. (d) Grain boundaries.

What is the most significant defect?

Answer: The line defect (edge dislocation or screw dislocation)

Several cells form a crystal, if many crystals are growing in a melt at the same time, where they meet = grain boundry as shown below: Matl constants

y o

ky d

Average grain diameter Called Hall-Petch equation

 In the phase diagram Carbon percentage is shown up to 6% only since commercially pure iron contains up to 0.008% C, Steels up to 2.11% C and Cast Iron up to 6.67% C. Pure Iron melts at 1583o C. When it cools first it forms delta ferrite, then austenite and finally alpha ferrite. Alpha ferrite or ferrite is a solid solution of BCC Iron with a maximum solid solubility of 0.022% C at a temperature of 727oC. Delta ferrite has no practical significance as it is stable only at high temperatures. Ferrite (derived from Latin word Ferrum) is relatively soft and ductile and is magnetic up to 768oC.

 Iron, between 1394oC to 912oC, undergoes transformation form BCC to FCC structure to give Gamma Iron, commonly known as Austenite. The solid solubility of Austenite is much higher than Ferrite and is up to 2.11 % C. Austenite is denser than ferrite and more ductile at higher temperatures. Steel in austenitic form is non-magnetic. Cementite, represented by right hand boundary of the phase diagram, is 100% iron carbide with 6.67% C. It is a very hard and brittle inter-metallic compound.

Pearlite Formation
Austenite precipitates Fe3C at Eutectoid Transformation Temperature (727C). When slow cooled, this is Pearlite

Diffusion of Carbon in Pearlite

Morphology of Pearlite
(a) (b)

(a) coarse pearlite

(b) fine pearlite 3000X

Influence of Cooling Rates

Faster cooling gives non-equilibrium microconstituents
Bainite Martensite And more!

Microconstituents vs. Cooling Rate

Spheroidite: Spherical globs of Fe3C in Ferrite Pearlite: Layers of ferrite and Fe3C
Course Pearlite Fine Pearlite Increasing Cooling Rate

Bainite: 200 500 C Transformation Martensite: Rapid Cooling

Bainite
Upper (550-350C) Rods of Fe3C Lower (350-250C) Fe3C Precipitates in Plates of Ferrite It is still Ferrite and Cementite!

Martensite
Diffusionless transformation of FCC to BCT (more volume!) Very hard & very brittle.

TTT Diagrams

Pearlite (ductile)

BCC + Fe3C with different microstructures

Martensite (brittle)

TTT Diagrams

Full TTT Diagram

The complete TTT diagram for an ironcarbon alloy of eutectoid composition.

A: Austenite B: Bainite M: Martensite P: Pearlite

Martensite

The needle-like structure of martensite, the white areas are retained austenite.

Annealing
Annealing primary purpose is to soften the steel and prepare it for additional processing such as cold forming or machining. What does it do?
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Reduce hardness Remove residual stress (stress relief) Improve toughness Restore ductility Refine grain size

Annealing
Process Steps:
1. Heat material into the Austenite region rule of thumb: hold steel for one hour for each one inch of thickness. 2. Slowly furnace cool the steel DO NOT QUENCH. 3. Slow cooling allows the Carbon to precipitate out, so resulting structure is coarse Pearlite with excess ferrite. 4. After annealing steel is quite soft and ductile.

Induction Hardening

Flame Hardening

Diffusion Hardening:
Most Common Types:
Carburizing Nitriding Carbonitriding Cyaniding

Diffusion Hardening - Carburizing:

Pack carburizing most common:
Part surrounded by charcoal treated with activating chemical then heated to austenite temperature. Charcoal forms CO2 gas which reacts with excess carbon in charcoal to form CO. CO reacts with low-carbon steel surface to form atomic carbon The atomic carbon diffuses into the surface Must then be quenched to get hardness!

Diffusion Hardening - Nitriding:

Nitrogen diffused into surface being treated. Nitrogen reacts with steel to form very hard iron and alloy nitrogen compounds. Process does not require quenching big advantage. The case can include a white layer which can be brittle disadvantage More expensive than carburizing

Source of nitrogen

Reduction process: 2NH3

2N + 3H2