Enhancement of ductility and strength in 410 stainless steel through cyclic heat treatment

Abstract

The 410 stainless steel alloy is used to manufacture small components like nuts and bolts and also larger components like gas turbines. The work done here focuses on tempering the 410 stainless steel to increase the ductility and strength. Heat treatment is generally done in order to get the desired mechanical properties by heating the material above its recrystallization temperature and cooling it back. The material is subjected to annealing, normalizing, quenching and tempering process in this experiment. On conducting mechanical test and metallurgical observation on the heat treated sample, we could observe change in material properties like wear characteristics, hardness, tensile and impact strength of the specimen when compared to the as-received material. And on studying the obtained results of the specimens after each heat treatment process, we can understand how each process affects the properties of the material. On quenching, the sample becomes more brittle and it can't be used to most applications, hence tempering is done to add toughness to the material.