Mizan tepi university

college of Engineering and technology

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Course name; Engineering materials II

Lecturer;Yonas S.(MSC)

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CHAPTER 1

STEEL

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Classification of Iron Carbon Steel:

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 Steel
• Steel is an alloy of iron and other elements,
primarily carbon.
• It is widely used in construction and other
applications because of its high tensile strength and
low cost.
• The carbon in typical steel alloys may contribute up
to 2.1% of its weight.
• Varying the amount of alloying elements, their
presence in the steel either as solute elements, or
as precipitated phases, retards the movement of
those dislocations. 4
 Steel conti…
• Steel's base metal is iron, which is able to take on
two crystalline forms (allotropic forms), body
centred cubic and face centred cubic (FCC),
depending on its temperature.
• It is the interaction of those allotropes with the
alloying elements, primarily carbon, that gives steel
and cast iron in their range of unique properties.

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 The Effects of Alloying Elements in Steel

I. C; CARBON
 As already stated, the presence of carbon in iron is necessary
to make steel.
 The hardness of steel (or more accurately, the hardenability)
is increased by the addition of more carbon, up to about 0.65
percent.
 Wear resistance can be increased in amounts up to about 1.5
percent.
 Beyond this amount, increases of carbon reduce toughness
and increase brittleness.
 The steels of interest to knife makers generally contain
between 0.5 and 1.5 percent carbon. They are described6 as
 Conti…
– Low Carbon: Under 0.4 percent
– Medium Carbon: 0.4 - 0.6 percent
– High Carbon: 0.7 - 1.5 percent
• Carbon is the single most important alloying
element in steel.
 Mn, MANGANESE
• Manganese slightly increases the strength of ferrite,
and also increases the hardness penetration of steel
in the quench by decreasing the critical quenching
speed.
• This also makes the steel more stable in the quench.
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 manganese
• Steels with manganese can be quenched in oil rather than water,
and therefore are less susceptible to cracking because of a
reduction in the shock of quenching.
• Manganese is present in most commercially made steels.
 Cr CHROMIUM
• As with manganese, chromium has a tendency to increase
hardness.
• Chromium can also increase the toughness of steel, as well as the
wear resistance.
• Probably one of the most well-known effects of chromium on
steel is the tendency to resist staining and corrosion.
• Steels with 14 percent or more chromium are referred to as
stainless steels. 8
 Mo, MOLYBDENUM

• Raises hot strength, has good creep resistance and

helps steel resist softening at elevated
temperatures.
• It is used to a large extent in tools and dies
intended for the hot working of metal.
• Ni NICKEL
 Increases strength and toughness and has good
fatigue resistance
 Steels with nickel usually have more impact
resistance than steels where nickel is absent.
 This is true especially at lower temperatures. 9
 W; TUNGSTEN

• Used in small amounts, tungsten combines with the

free carbides in steel during heat treatment, to
produce high wear resistance with little or no loss of
toughness.
• High amounts combined with chromium gives steel a
property known as red hardness.
• This means that the steel will not lose its working
hardness at high temperatures.
• An example of this would be tools designed to cut
hard materials at high speeds, where the friction
between the tool and the material would generate 10
 V ; VANADIUM

• Vanadium helps control grain growth during heat treatment.

• By inhibiting grain growth it helps increase the toughness
and strength of the steel.
Ti; TITANIUM
• This element, when used in conjunction with Boron,
increases the effectiveness of the Boron in the hardenability
of steel.
• Boron can significantly increase the hardenability of steel
without loss of ductility.
• Its effectiveness is most noticeable at lower carbon levels.
• The addition of boron is usually in very small amounts
ranging from 0.0005 to 0.003 percent. 11
 Si SILICON

• Silicon is used as a deoxidizer in the manufacture of

steel.
• It slightly increases the strength of ferrite, and when
used in conjunction with other alloys can help
increase the toughness and hardness penetration of
steel.

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 Different classes of Steel

• Steels can be categorized in to four main

classifications. These are;
I. Carbon steels
II. Stainless steels
III. Tool steels
IV. High strength low alloy steels(HSLA)
V. Maraging steels

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 Carbon steels
• Carbon steel is steel in which the main interstitial
alloying constituent element is carbon in the range
of 0.12–2.0%.
• As the carbon percentage content rises, steel has
the ability to become harder and stronger through
heat treating; however, it becomes less ductile.
• Regardless of the heat treatment, a higher carbon
content reduces weldability.
• In carbon steels, the higher carbon content lowers
the melting point.
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 Types of carbon steels
• Carbon steels can be classified in to four categories
based on the amount of carbon content used in
steel. these are
I. Low carbon steel (mild steel )
• steel containing a small percentage of carbon,
strong and tough but not readily tempered), also
known as plain-carbon steel
• It is now the most common form of steel because
its price is relatively low while it provides material
properties that are acceptable for many
applications. 15
 Low carbon steel
• Low-carbon steel contains approximately 0.05–0.25%
carbon making it malleable and ductile.
• Mild steel has a relatively low tensile strength, but it
is cheap and easy to form;
• surface hardness can be increased through
carburizing.
• It is often used when large quantities of steel are
needed, for example as structural steel.
• The density of mild steel is approximately 7.85 g/cm3
and the Young's modulus is 200 GPa.
• Manganese is often added to improve the
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hardenability of low-carbon steels.
 Medium-carbon steel
• Approximately 0.3–0.6% carbon content.
• Balances ductility and strength and has good wear
resistance.
• used for large parts, forging and automotive
components

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 High-carbon steel

• Approximately 0.6–1.0% carbon content.

• Very strong, used for springs and high-strength wires.
• Ultra-high-carbon steel
• Approximately 1.25–2.0% carbon content
• Steels that can be tempered to great hardness.
• Used for special purposes like (non-industrial-purpose)
knives, axles or punches.
• Most steels with more than 2.5% carbon content are
made using powder metallurgy.
• Note that when the amount of carbon increases the
hardness of steel also increases but the ductility
decreases.
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 Stainless steel

• In metallurgy, stainless steel, also known as inox

steel from French inoxydable (inoxidizable),
• is a steel alloy with minimum of 10.5% chromium
content by mass.
• Stainless steel is notable for its corrosion
resistance, and it is widely used for food handling
and cutlery among many other applications.
• Stainless steel does not readily corrode, rust or
stain with water as ordinary steel does.

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 Stainless steel…
• Stainless steel is used where both the properties of
steel and corrosion resistance are required.
• Stainless steel differs from carbon steel by the
amount of chromium present.
• Unprotected carbon steel rusts readily when exposed
to air and moisture
• stainless steels contain sufficient chromium to
undergo passivation, forming an inert film of
chromium oxide on the surface.
• This layer prevents further corrosion by blocking
oxygen diffusion to the steel surface and stops 20
 Application areas of stainless steel
• Stainless steel’s resistance to corrosion and staining,
low maintenance, and familiar lustre make it an
ideal material for many applications.
• The alloy is milled into coils, sheets, plates, bars,
wire, and tubing to be used in ;
• cookware, cutlery, household hardware, surgical
instruments, major appliances, industrial
equipment (for example, in sugar refineries) and as
an automotive and aerospace structural alloy and
construction material in large buildings.
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 Tool Steel
• refers to a variety of carbon and alloy steels that are
particularly well-suited to be made into tools.
• Their suitability comes from their distinctive
hardness, resistance to abrasion and deformation.
• tool steels are suited for their use in the shaping of
other materials.
• With carbon content between 0.5% and 1.5%, tool
steels are manufactured under carefully controlled
conditions to produce the required quality.
• The presence of carbides in their matrix plays the
dominant role in the qualities of tool steel. 22
 Tool steels
• The four major alloying elements in tool steel that
form carbides are: tungsten, chromium, vanadium
and molybdenum.
• There are six groups of tool steels: water-hardening,
cold-work, shock-resistant, high-speed, hot-work,
and special purpose.
• The choice of group to select depends on cost,
working temperature, required surface hardness,
strength, shock resistance, and toughness
requirements.
• Tool steels are used for cutting, pressing, extruding,
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and coining of metals and other materials.
 High-strength low-alloy steel (HSLA)

• HSLA is a type of alloy steel that provides better

mechanical properties or greater resistance to
corrosion than carbon steel.
• HSLA steels vary from other steels in that they are
not made to meet a specific chemical composition
but rather to specific mechanical properties.
• They have carbon content between 0.05–0.25% to
retain formability and weldability.
• Other alloying elements include up to 2.0%
manganese and small quantities of copper, nickel,
niobium, nitrogen, vanadium, chromium,
molybdenum, titanium, calcium.
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 HSLA conti…
• Copper, titanium, vanadium, and niobium are added for
strengthening purposes.
• Copper, silicon, nickel, chromium, and phosphorus are
added to increase corrosion resistance.
• They are used in cars, trucks, cranes, bridges, roller
coasters and other structures that are designed to
handle large amounts of stress or need a good strength-
to-weight ratio.
• HSLA steel cross-sections and structures are usually 20 to
30% lighter than a carbon steel with the same strength.
• HSLA steels usually have densities of around 7800 kg/m³.
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 Maraging steels

• Maraging steels are steels (iron alloys) that are

known for possessing superior strength and
toughness without losing malleability.
• These steels are a special class of low-carbon ultra-
high-strength steels that derive their strength not
from carbon, but from precipitation of intermetallic
compounds.
• The principal alloying element is 15 to 25 wt.% nickel
.
• Secondary alloying elements, which include cobalt,
molybdenum, and titanium, are added to produce
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inter metallic precipitates.
 Maraging steels conti…
• Addition of chromium produces stainless grades
resistant to corrosion.
• This also indirectly increases hardenability.
 Properties of maraging steels
• Due to the low carbon content maraging steels have
good machinability.
• Maraging steels offer good weldability.
• Due to the high alloy content maraging steels have a
high hardenability.
• Non-stainless varieties of maraging steel are
moderately corrosion-resistant.
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 Physical and mechanical properties of
maraging steels.
• Density: 8.1 g/cm³
• Melting point; 1,413 °C
• Thermal conductivity: 25.5 W/m·K
• Yield tensile strength: typically 1,400–2,400 MPa
• Elongation at break: up to 15%
• fracture toughness: up to 175 Mpa
• Young's modulus: 210 Gpa

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 Concept of Phase Diagram
• The understanding of phase diagrams for alloy systems
is extremely important .because
• There is a strong correlation between microstructure
and mechanical properties.
• the development of microstructure of an alloy is
related to the characteristics of its phase diagram.
• phase diagrams provide valuable information about
melting, casting, crystallization, and other phenomena.
• Solubility Limit; For many alloy systems and at some
specific temperature, there is a maximum
concentration of solute atoms that may dissolve in the
solvent to form a solid solution. 29
The Iron–Iron carbide phase diagram

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 Fe-Fe3C phase diagram
• Pure iron, upon heating, experiences two changes in
crystal structure before it melts.
• At room temperature the stable form, called ferrite, or α
iron, has a BCC crystal structure.
• Ferrite experiences a polymorphic transformation to FCC
austenite, or γ iron, at (912ºC ).
• This austenite persists to (1394ºC), at which temperature
the FCC austenite reverts back to a BCC phase known as
δ ferrite, which finally melts at (1538ºC).
• The composition axis in Figure extends only to 6.70 wt. %
C; at this concentration the intermediate compound iron
carbide, or cementite (Fe3C), is formed. 31
 Fe-Fe3c
• In the BCC ferrite, only small concentrations of
carbon are soluble; the maximum solubility is 0.022
wt.% at (727ºC).
• The maximum solubility of carbon in austenite, 2.14
wt. %, occurs at 1147ºC.
• The δ ferrite is virtually the same as α ferrite, except
for the range of temperatures over which each exists.
• δ ferrite is stable only at relatively high temperatures,
• Cementite (Fe3C) forms when the solubility limit of
carbon in α ferrite is exceeded below 727ºC
• cementite is very hard and brittle 32
Fe-Fe3c phase diagram

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 Heat treatment Processes
• Heat treating is a group of industrial and metalworking
processes used to alter(change) the physical, sometimes
chemical and mechanical properties of a material.
• Heat treatment involves the use of heating or chilling,
normally to extreme temperatures, to achieve a desired
result such as hardening or softening of a material.
• Heat treatment techniques include annealing, case
hardening, precipitation strengthening, tempering,
normalizing and quenching.
• Metallic materials consist of a microstructure of small
crystals called "grains" or crystallites.
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 Annealing

• The term annealing refers to a heat treatment in which

a material is exposed to an elevated temperature for
an extended time period and then slowly cooled.
• Ordinarily, annealing is carried out to ;
I. relieve stresses
II. increase softness, ductility, and toughness;
III. produce a specific microstructure
• Annealing consists of heating a metal to a specific
temperature and then cooling at a rate that will
produce a refined microstructure.
• The rate of cooling is generally slow.
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 Annealing
• The nature of the grains (i.e. grain size and
composition) is one of the most effective factors
that can determine the overall mechanical
behaviour of the metal.
• Heat treating is often used to alter the mechanical
properties of a metallic alloy, manipulating
properties such as the hardness, strength,
toughness, ductility, and elasticity.
• Heat treatment provides an efficient way to
manipulate the properties of the metal by
controlling the rate of diffusion and the rate of
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 Annealing
• Annealing is most often used to soften a metal for
cold working, to improve machinability, or to
enhance properties like electrical conductivity.
• Any annealing process consists of three stages:
I. heating to the desired temperature
II. holding or “soaking” at that temperature
III. cooling, usually to room temperature
• The metal is heated to a temperature where
recrystallization can occur, thereby repairing the
defects caused by plastic deformation.
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 Annealing
• Ferrous alloys are usually either "full annealed" or
"process annealed."
• Full annealing requires very slow cooling rates, in
order to form coarse microstructure.
• In process annealing, the cooling rate may be
faster; up to, and including normalizing.
• The main goal of process annealing is to produce a
uniform microstructure.

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 Stress Relief
• Internal residual stresses may develop in metal pieces in response
to the following:

I. Plastic deformation processes such as machining and grinding;

II. Non-uniform cooling of a piece that was processed or fabricated
at an elevated temperature, such as a weld or a casting; and
III. A phase transformation that is induced upon cooling wherein
parent and product phases have different densities.
• Distortion and warpage may result if these residual stresses are
not removed.
• They may be eliminated by a stress relief annealing heat
treatment in which the piece is heated to the recommended
temperature
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 Normalizing

• An annealing heat treatment called normalizing is

used to refine the grains (i.e., to decrease the
average grain size) and produce a more uniform
and desirable size distribution.
• Normalizing is accomplished by heating at least
(55ºC ) above the upper critical temperature.

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 Precipitation hardening
• The strength and hardness of some metal alloys may
be enhanced by the formation of extremely small
uniformly dispersed particles of a second phase
within the original phase matrix;
• this must be accomplished by phase transformations
that are induced by appropriate heat treatments.
• The process is called precipitation hardening
because the small particles of the new phase are
termed “precipitates.”
• “Age hardening” is also used to designate this
procedure because the strength develops with time,
or as the alloy ages. 41
 Precipitation hardening
• Examples of alloys that are hardened by
precipitation treatments include aluminum–
copper, copper–beryllium, copper–tin, and
magnesium–aluminum; some ferrous alloys are
also precipitation hardenable.
• Alloys may age "naturally" meaning that the
precipitates form at room temperature, or they
may age "artificially" when precipitates only form
at elevated temperatures.

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 Quenching

• Quenching is a process of cooling a metal at a rapid

rate.
• To harden by quenching, a metal (usually steel or
cast iron) must be heated above the upper critical
temperature and then quickly cooled.
• Depending on the alloy and other considerations
(such as concern for maximum hardness vs. cracking
and distortion), cooling may be done with forced air
or other gases, (such as nitrogen).
• Liquids may be used, due to their better thermal
conductivity, such as oil, water, a polymer dissolved
in water, or brine.
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 Tempering

• Most applications require that quenched parts be

tempered.
• Tempering consists of heating steel below the lower
critical temperature, (often from 400 to 1105 ˚F or 205
to 595 ˚C, depending on the desired results), to impart
some toughness.
• Higher tempering temperatures (may be up to 1,300 ˚F
or 700 ˚C, depending on the alloy and application) are
sometimes used to impart further ductility, although
some yield strength is lost.
• Tempering may also be performed on normalized
steels. 44
 Case hardening

• Case hardening is a thermochemical diffusion

process in which an alloying element, most
commonly carbon or nitrogen, diffuses into the
surface of a monolithic metal.
• The resulting interstitial solid solution is harder
than the base material, which improves wear
resistance without sacrificing toughness.

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END OF CHAPTER I

THANK YOU !!!

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