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Heat Treatments of Metals
Heat Treatments of Metals
Chapter 6 Outline
Mechanical Properties of Metals
How do metals respond to external loads?
▪ Plastic Deformation
➢ Yield Strength
➢ Tensile Strength
➢ Ductility
ALLOYS
Not tested: true stress-true stain relationships, resilience, details
of the different types of hardness tests, variability of material
properties
University of Virginia, Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering 1
HEAT TREATMENT
Heat treatment – controlled heating and cooling
of metals for the purpose of altering their
properties
at least 90% of all heat-treating operations are
carried out on steel.
Heat treatment uses:
Increase strength
Improving machining characteristics
Restoring ductility
HEAT TREATMENT
1) Hardening
Two-step process:
1. Heating above a critical temperature
2. Rapid cooling (quenching)
Effect of carbon content of steel on hardness
0 to 0.3 percent: not practical to harden
0.3 to 0.7 percent: hardness obtainable increases very
rapidly
above 0.7 percent: hardness obtainable increases only
Steps:
1. Temperature is raised
slightly below A1.
2. Held in this temperature to
allow recrystallization of the
ferrite phase.
3. Cooled in still air at any rate.
STRESS-RELIEF ANNEAL
- Reduces residual stress in large castings, welded assemblis and cold-formed parts
Steps:
1. Metals are heated to temperatures
below A1.
2. Temperature is held for an
extended time
3. Material is slowly cooled.
SPHEROIDIZATION
- Produces a structure where the cementite is in form of small
spheroids dispersed throughout the ferrite matrix
Three ways:
1. prolonged heating at a
temperature below the A1 then
slowly cooling the material
2. cycling between temperatures
slightly above and below the A1
3. for high-alloy steels, heating to
750-800oC or higher and holding
it for several hours
-no significant phase transformations like that of steel
-Three purposes:
1. produce a uniform, homogenous structure
2. provide stress relief
3. bring about recrystallization
- process is usually slowly heating the material to moderate temperatures,
holding it for a certain time to allow change in desired properties to take
place then is slowly cooled
Stress-relief annealing – reduces tendency for stress-
corrosion cracking
Tempering – reduce brittleness, increase ductility and
toughness, reduce residual stress
Austempering – provides high ductility and moderately
high strength
Martempering – lessens tendency to crack, distort and