Relationship between hardness and microstructure of continuously cooled C–Mn–V steels

The relationships between hardness and the volume fraction of martensite for continuously cooled steels containing 0·1–0·3%C, 1·6%Mn, 0–0·3% V (all wt-%), which are used to measure the hardenability expressed by the ideal critical diameter, have been established. It has been shown that for steels transformed to a fine mixture of lath martensite and lath bainite it is not possible to measure the volume fraction of martensite by means of quantitative optical metallography and therefore the volume fraction of martensite was determined from dilatometric records of continuously cooled specimens. The continuous cooling transformation diagrams were determined and microstructures of the dilatometric specimens were examined by optical and transmission electron microscopy. The values of the 50% martensite hardness established for the steels containing vanadium were found to be outside the range given by the widely used Hodge and Orehoski relationship. The relevance of the results to the assessment of hardenability by means of the ideal critical diameter concept is discussed.

MST/484