LECTURE 19
Liquid cooling proceeds through three separate stages during a quenching
operation.
Vapor-blanket cooling describes the first cooling stage, when the quenching
medium is vaporized at the metal surface and cooling is relatively slow.
Vapor-transport cooling starts when the metal has cooled down enough so that
the vapor film is no longer stable and wetting of the metal surface occurs. This
is the fastest stage of cooling using boiling phenomenon.
Liquid cooling starts when the surface temperature of the metal reaches the
boiling point of the liquid so that vapor is no longer formed. This is the slowest
stage of cooling which happens through convection mechanism.
Tempered Martensite
• The ductility and toughness of martensite may be enhanced and these
internal stresses relieved by a heat treatment known as tempering.
• Tempering is accomplished by heating a martensitic steel to a
temperature below the eutectoid for a specified time period.
• Normally, tempering is carried out at temperatures between 250 C and
650 °C; internal stresses, however, may be relieved at temperatures as low
as 200 °C.
• This tempering heat treatment allows, by diffusional processes, the
formation of tempered martensite, according to the reaction.
Surface Hardening of Steel
Hardening by martensite transformation
• Martensite – is a supersaturated solid solution of carbon trapped in a body-
centered tetragonal structure. This is a highly distorted structure that results in high
hardness and strength.
• Martensite atoms are less densely packed than austenite atoms, so a volumetric
expansion occurs during the transformation. As a result, highly localized stresses
produce distortions in the matrix.
• The transformation is diffusionless, and small volumes of austenite suddenly
change crystal structure by shearing actions.
• Martensite transformation cannot be suppressed. Ms is a function of chemical
composition only.
• Martensite is never in a state of equilibrium, although it can persist indefinitely at
or near room temperature. It would eventually decompose into ferrite and
cementite.
Surface Hardening by Localized Heat Treatment
• These processes require a high enough carbon content to obtain the required
hardness, a medium-carbon steel with a carbon content of 0.35 to 0.50 wt% is
usually selected.
• Initially, the part is hardened by conventional quenching and tempering to
produce the desired core hardness.
• Sometimes, normalizing will produce the desired core hardness.
• The surface is then reheated into the austenitization range and immediately
quenched to produce fresh martensite at the surface.
• The part is then retempered to produce the desired surface hardness.
• The depth of the martensite layer is the case depth.
Flame hardening
• The objective of flame hardening is to austenitize the steel at and near the
surface by a gas flame created by burning acetylene, propane, or natural
gas.
• And then it is to remove the flame and rapidly quench the work to
produce martensite.
• Flame hardening is a very rapid and efficient method for producing cases
as deep as 6.3 mm.
• It is often used where small quantities of parts require hardening, the
part is large and bulky, or the heat treating facilities are limited.
Flame Hardening
Induction hardening
• In induction hardening, heat is supplied by surrounding the part with
an inductor coil carrying a high-frequency current in the range of 2 to
500 kHz.
• The coil acts like the primary winding of a transformer. The oscillating
field produced by the induction coil induces electrical eddy currents in
the steel within a certain depth of the outer surface, called the skin
depth, which decreases as the frequency is increased.
• The eddy currents produce Joule resistance heating (I2R) in the skin
depth that rapidly raises the surface temperature.
• Higher frequencies result in a shallower depth of heating and are
therefore used for smaller-diameter workpieces.
• Additional heating is supplied by hysteresis losses and the surface
usually attains the austenization temperature within a few seconds.
• The energy lost as heat, which is known as the hysteresis loss, in
reversing the magnetization of the material,
• The part is then quenched to form martensite on the surface layers.
Since the copper inductor coils are subject to radiation heating, they are
made from hollow, water-cooled copper tubing. Where possible, the
part is slowly rotated during heating to obtain more uniform heating.
• To provide a uniform starting fine-grained microstructure, the steel is
often normalized prior to induction hardening.
Advantages and Disadvantages
• Induction hardening is readily automated. It is more adaptable
than flame heating because a wide variety of coil
configurations are possible.
• The case depth can be controlled more accurately in induction
hardening than with other processes. The depth can be
controlled by varying the frequency, the current, and the
amount of time the current is in contact with the part.
• The main disadvantage of induction hardening is the cost of
the equipment and the requirement for a skilled technician to
initially set up the process. However, once it is set up, a
relatively unskilled technician can operate it.
