• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2007.10a
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• pp.154-157
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• 2007

The austenite phase observed in low carbon HSLA steels is well known to be decomposed to various bainitic microstructures, such as granular bainite, acicular ferrite and bainitic ferrite during continuous cooling process. These bainitic microstructures have been usually identified by using either scanning electron microscope (SEM) or transmission electron microscope (TEM). However, SEM and TEM images do no exactly coincide, because of the quite different sample preparation method in SEM and TEM observations. These conventional analysis method is, thus, not suitable for characterization of the complex bainitic microstructure. In this study, focused ion beam (FIB) technique was applied to make site-specific TEM specimens and to identify the 3-dimensional grain morphologies of the bainitic microstructure. The morphological feature and grain boundary characteristics of each bainitic microstructure were exactly identified.

• Metals and materials international
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.1202-1212
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• 2018

The effects of Nickle (Ni) addition on bainitic transformation and property of ultrahigh strength bainitic steels are investigated by three austempering processes. The results indicate that Ni addition hinders the isothermal bainite transformation kinetics, and decreases the volume fraction of bainite due to the decrease of chemical driving force for nucleation and growth of bainite transformation. Moreover, the product of tensile strength and total elongation (PSE) of high carbon bainitic steels decreases with Ni addition at higher austempering temperatures (220 and $250^{\circ}C$), while it shows no significant difference at lower austempering temperature ($200^{\circ}C$). For the same steel (Ni-free or Ni-added steel), the amounts of bainite and RA firstly increase and then decrease with the increase of the austempering temperature, resulting in the highest PSE in the sample austempered at temperature of $220^{\circ}C$. In addition, the effects of austempering time on bainite amount and property of high carbon bainitic steels are also analyzed. It indicates that in a given transformation time range of 30 h, more volume of bainite and better mechanical property in high carbon bainitic steels can be obtained by increasing the isothermal transformation time.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2008.05a
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• pp.431-434
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• 2008

Effects of microstructure on the toughness of low carbon HSLA steels were investigated. Nickel decreased the ferrite-austenite transformation temperature, resulted in increase of the fraction of bainitic ferrite. However, it was decreased with increasing deformation amount at austenite region. Since fine austenite grains formed by dynamic recrystallization under large strain transformed to acicular ferrite or granular bainite rather than bainitic ferrite. The effective grain size, thus, was decreased by deformation and it resulted in lower ductile-brittle transition temperature (DBTT). The bainitic ferrite was thought to inhibit the fracture crack initiation and to delay the crack propagation by its high dislocation density and hard interlath $2^{nd}$ phase constituents, respectively. Thus, DBTT was also decreased by Ni addition in low carbon HSLA steels.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.48 no.9
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• pp.798-806
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• 2010

The effects of alloying elements and the cooling condition on the microstructure, tensile properties, and Charpy impact properties of high-strength bainitic steel plates fabricated by a controlled rolling process were investigated in the present study. Eight kinds of steel plates were fabricated by varying C, Cr, and Nb additions under two different cooling rates, and their microstructures and tensile and Charpy impact properties were evaluated. The microstructures present in the steels increased in the order of granular bainite, acicular ferrite, bainitic ferrite, and martensite as the carbon equivalent or cooling rate increased, which resulted in a decrease in the ductility and Charpy absorbed energy. The steels containing a considerable amount of bainitic ferrite or martensite showed very high strengths, together with good ductility and Charpy absorbed energy. In order to achieve the best combination of strength, ductility, and Charpy absorbed energy, granular bainite and acicular ferrite were properly included in the high-strength bainitic steels by controlling the carbon equivalent and cooling rate, while about 50 vol.% of bainitic ferrite or martensite was maintained to maintain the high strength.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.48 no.7
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• pp.615-624
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• 2010

This study is concerned with tensile and Charpy impact properties of high-strength bainitic steels fabricated by controlled rolling process. Six kinds of steels were fabricated by varying finish rolling temperature, start cooling temperature, and cooling rate, and their microstructures and tensile and Charpy impact properties were investigated. Their effective grain sizes were also characterized by the electron backscatter diffraction analysis. The microstructures of the steels rolled in the single phase region were most similar to those of the steels rolled in the two phase region. The steels cooled from $700{^{\circ}C}$ were composed mainly of granular bainites, while those cooled from $600{^{\circ}C}$ contained a number of bainitic ferrites, which resulted in the decrease in ductility and upper shelf energy in spite of the increase in strength. In the steels cooling from $600^{\circ}C$, fine acicular ferrites were well formed when the cooling rate was slow, which led to the best combination of high ductility, high upper shelf energy, and low energy transition temperature according to the decrease in the overall effective grain size due to the presence of acicular ferrites having smaller effective grain size.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.46 no.10
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• pp.617-626
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• 2008

This study is concerned with the effect of Cu and B addition on microstructure and mechanical properties of high-strength bainitic steels. Six kinds of steels were fabricated by varying alloying elements and hot-rolling conditions, and their microstructures and tensile and Charpy impact properties were investigated. Their effective grain sizes were also characterized by the electron back-scatter diffraction analysis. The tensile test results indicated that the B- or Cu-containing steels had the higher yield and tensile strengths than the B- or Cu-free steels because their volume fractions of bainitic ferrite and martensite were quite high. The B- or Cu-free steels had the higher upper shelf energy than the B- or Cu-containing steels because of their higher volume fraction of granular bainite. In the steel containing 10 ppm B without Cu, the best combination of high strengths, high upper shelf energy, and low energy transition temperature could be obtained by the decrease in the overall effective grain size due to the presence of bainitic ferrite having smaller effective grain size.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.75-81
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• 2015

Effects of B and Cu additions on the microstructure and mechanical properties of high-strength bainitic steels were investigated in this study. Six kinds of high-strength bainitic steels with different B and Cu contents were fabricated by thermo-mechanical control process composed of controlled rolling and accelerated cooling. The microstructures of the steels were analyzed using optical and transmission microscopy, and the tensile and impact tests were conducted on them in order to investigate the correlation of microstructure with mechanical properties. Depending on the addition of B and Cu, various low-temperature transformation products such as GB (granular bainite), DUB (degenerated upper bainite), LB (lower bainite), and LM (lath martensite) were formed in the steels. The addition of B and Cu increased the yield and tensile strengths because of improved hardenability and solid solution strengthening, but decreased the ductility and low-temperature toughness. The steels containing both B and Cu had a very high strength above 1.0 GPa, but showed a worse low-temperature toughness of higher DBTT (ductile-to-brittle transition temperature) and lower absorbed energy. On the other hand, the steels having GB and DUB showed a good combination of tensile and impact properties in terms of strength, ductility, yield ratio, absorbed energy, and DBTT.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.78-86
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• 2004

Effects of the annealing parameters on the formation of ferrites transformed at low temperatures were studied in cold-rolled ultra low carbon steels with niobium and/or chromium. Niobium and chromium were found to be effective in the formation of the low temperature transformation ferrites. The low temperature transformation ferrites more easily formed when both higher annealing temperature and longer annealing time, allowing substitutional alloying elements to distribute between phases, are in combination with faster cooling rate. It was found from EBSD study that the additions of niobium or chromium resulted in the increase in the numbers of high angle grain boundaries and the decrease in those of the low angle grain boundaries in the microstructures. Both granular bainitic ferrite and bainitic ferrite were characterized by the not clearly etched grain boundaries in light microscopy because of the low angle grain boundaries.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.28 no.9
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• pp.522-527
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• 2018

This study investigates the effects of isothermal holding temperature and time on the microstructure, hardness and Charpy impact properties of medium-carbon bainitic steel specimens. Medium-carbon steel specimens with different bainitic microstructures are fabricated by varying the isothermal conditions and their microstructures are characterized using OM, SEM and EBSD analysis. Hardness and Charpy impact tests are also performed to examine the correlation of microstructure and mechanical properties. The microstructural analysis results reveal that granular bainite, bainitic ferrite, lath martensite and retained austenite form differently in the specimens. The volume fraction of granular bainite and bainitic ferrite increases as the isothermal holding temperature increases, which decreases the hardness of specimens isothermally heat-treated at $300^{\circ}C$ or higher. The specimens isothermally heat-treated at $250^{\circ}C$ exhibit the highest hardness due to the formation of lath martensite, irrespective of isothermal holding time. The Charpy impact test results indicate that increasing isothermal holding time improves the impact toughness because of the increase in volume fraction of granular bainite and bainitic ferrite, which have a relatively soft microstructure compared to lath martensite for specimens isothermally heat-treated at $250^{\circ}C$ and $300^{\circ}C$.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.87-92
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• 2020

This study deals with the effects of austempering time on the microstructure and mechanical properties of ultra-high strength nanostructured bainitic steels with high carbon and silicon contents. The steels are composed of bainite, martensite and retained austenite by austempering and quenching. As the duration of austempering increases, the thickness of bainitic ferrite increases, but the thickness of retained austenite decreases. Some retained austenites with lower stability are more easily transformed to martensite during tensile testing, which has a detrimental effect on the elongation due to the brittleness of transformed martensite. With increasing austempering time, the hardness decreased and then remained stable because the transformation to nanostructured bainite compensates for the decrease in the volume fraction of martensite. Charpy impact test results indicated that increasing austempering time improved the impact toughness because the formation of brittle martensite was prevented by the decreased fraction and increased stability of retained austenite.