Influence of heat treatment on the absorbed energy of carbon steel alloys using oil quenching and water quenching

Abstract

Carbon steel alloys are modified by heat treatment processes so that structural components are able to withstand and sustain external forces and loads which specified operating conditions and have desired useful life. In this work, oil quenching and water quenching were tested and compared to low carbon steel, medium carbon steel and high carbon steel alloys. During quenching process, the specimens were heated at 900C° and soaked for 20 minutes in the furnace, three specimens were then quenched in oil and other three in water with the objective to improve impact toughness, the results obtained with instrumented Charpy impact tests showed that in low carbon steel the oil quenching treatment was able to increase impact toughness 159% and 107% by water quenching, for medium carbon steel, impact toughness by oil quenching increased 70% and water quenching increase 59%.The different behavior of high carbon steel appears when specimens heat treated, 85% impact toughness decrease in oil quenching and 50% decrease in water quenched.