CONTROL OF PROPERTIES

Impurities in Steel and their

Effects
 Silicon
• Found in small quantities in all Steel ( 0.1% -
0.3%). In Specia; Steels it may be as low as
0.03% or as high as 1,0%.
• Forms a Solid Solution in Iron.
• Slightly raises the Strength and Hardness of
Steel.
• Raises the Critical Points.
• A de-oxidizing Agent.
 Sulphur
• A VERY harmful element. Efforts are made to
keep it to a minimum ( about 0.015% but it
may be as high as 0.6% in cheap steel)
• Forms iron sulphide which is a very brittle
substance. This forms as a thin film separating
the pearlite or ferrite grains, thus greatly
reducing the strength of the steel ( gives rise
"hot short or cold short")
• Manganese sulphide is stronger than iron
sulphide and provided that there is enough
manganese present the sulphur will all
combine with it in preference to the iron.
• It is common practice to add eight times
manganese required to combine with the
sulphur.
• Iron sulphide melts below the working
temperature of iron.
 Phosphorous
• Combines with Iron to form a Phosphide.
• It increases the hardness and Tensile strength of Steel.
• It SERIOUSLY affects the ductility and resistance to
shock or impact.
• Increases grain size.
• 0.04% is allowable in Structural Steel. 0.035%
Maximum in Tool Steel.

NOTE: Both Phosphorous and Sulphur tend to segregate. i.e.These two

elements tend to concentrate in the grain boundaries during freezing and in
these areas they may greatly exceed the average percentage.
 Lead
• Added to all classes of steel to improve the
machinability of the Steel.
• It is supposed to improve tool life
 Manganese
• A powerful and most effective de-oxidant.
• Has a good effect on Sulphur.
• A good element for producing perfectly sound
Steel free from internal defects such as Blow
Holes and gas cavities.
• Improves the Tenacity of Steel without
seriously affecting it's Ductility.
• Increases the depth hardness of hardened
Steel.
• With between 11% and 15% manganese an
about 1% Carbon Steel retains it's austenitic
condition even after quenching in water after
heating to 1000 deg.C. This Steel is non-
magnetic. It is also soft but posses a
remarkable resistance to abrasion.
 Tin
• This metal should be avoided. It forms a low
melting point brittle film round the grain
boundaries making the Steel practically
useless.
 Gaseous Impurities
• Oxygen, In general has a bad influence on the
properties of steel. It is rarely present in
quantities above 0.025%
• Nitrogen. Found in quantities from 0.005% to
0.3% in welds, were it is undesirable. It has a
hardening and em-brittling effect.
Intensionally added to the surface layer in
case hardening to produce an abrasive
resistant surface.
• Hydrogen. This element has a bad effect. It
produces gas cavities near the skin of castings
and ingots. Also "flakes" and hair line cracks
can be attributed too it'd presence.
 Steel
• In essence, steel is composed of iron and
carbon, although it is the amount of carbon,
as well as the level of impurities and
additional alloying elements that determines
the properties of each steel grade.
• The carbon content in steel can range from
0.1-1.5%, but the most widely used grades of
steel contain only 0.1-0.25% carbon. Elements
such as manganese, phosphorus and sulphur
are found in all grades of steel, but, whereas
manganese provides beneficial effects,
phosphorus and sulphur are deleterious to
steel's strength and durability.
 Types of Steel
• Carbon Steels
• Alloy Steels
• Stainless Steels
• Tool Steels
 Carbon Steels
• Carbon steels contain trace amounts of alloying
elements and account for 90% of total steel
production. Carbon steels can be further
categorized into three groups depending on their
carbon content:
• Low Carbon Steels/Mild Steels contain up to 0.3%
carbon
• Medium Carbon Steels contain 0.3 – 0.6% carbon
• High Carbon Steels contain more than 0.6%
carbon
 Alloy Steels
• Alloy steels contain alloying elements (e.g.
manganese, silicon, nickel, titanium, copper,
chromium and aluminum) in varying proportions in
order to manipulate the steel's properties, such as
its hardenability, corrosion resistance, strength, form
ability, weldability or ductility.
• Applications for alloys steel include pipelines, auto
parts, transformers, power generators and electric
motors.
 Stainless Steels
• Stainless steels generally contain between 10-
20% chromium as the main alloying element
and are valued for high corrosion resistance.
With over 11% chromium, steel is about 200
times more resistant to corrosion than mild
steel. These steels can be divided into three
groups based on their crystalline structure:
• Austenitic: Austenitic steels are non-magnetic
and non heat-treatable, and generally contain
18% chromium, 8% nickel and less than 0.8%
carbon. Austenitic steels form the largest
portion of the global stainless steel market
and are often used in food processing
equipment, kitchen utensils and piping.
• Ferritic: Ferritic steels contain trace amounts
of nickel, 12-17% chromium, less than 0.1%
carbon, along with other alloying elements,
such asmolybdenum, aluminum or titanium.
These magnetic steels cannot be hardened
with heat treatment, but can be strengthened
by cold works.
• Martensitic: Martensitic steels contain 11-17%
chromium, less than 0.4% nickel and up to
1.2% carbon. These magnetic and heat-
treatable steels are used in knives, cutting
tools, as well as dental and surgical
equipment.
 Tool Steels
• Tool steels contain tungsten,
molybdenum, cobalt and vanadium in varying
quantities to increase heat resistance and
durability, making them ideal for cutting and
drilling equipment.
Steel products can also be divided by their
shapes and related applications:
• Long/Tubular Products include bars and rods,
rails, wires, angles, pipes, and shapes and
sections. These products are commonly used
in the automotive and construction sectors.
• Flat Products include plates, sheets, coils and
strips. These materials are mainly used in
automotive parts, appliances, packaging,
shipbuilding, and construction.
• Other Products include valves, fittings, and
flanges and are mainly used as piping
materials.
 Heat Treatment of Steels
• It is the alteration of the mechanical
properties of an alloy through the control of
thermal effects.
• Steel can be treated by intense heat to give it different
properties of hardness and softness. This depends on
the amount of carbon in the steel (only high carbon
steel can be hardened and tempered).

• CARBON CONTENT OF COMMON STEELS: Mild steel:

0.4% carbon, Medium carbon steel approximately 0.8%
carbon, High Carbon Steel approximately 1.2% carbon
(this steel is also known as Tool Steel and includes
Silver Steel and Gauge Plate).
• Mild steel and medium carbon steel do not
have enough carbon to change their
crystalline structure and consequently cannot
be hardened and tempered. Medium carbon
steel may become slightly tougher although it
cannot be harden to the point where it cannot
be filed or cut with a hacksaw (the classic test
of whether steel has been hardened).
• If steel is heated until it glows red and is
quenched in clean water immediately, it
becomes very hard but also brittle. This means
it is likely to break or snap if put under great
pressure. On the other hand, if the red hot
steel is allowed to cool slowly, the resulting
steel will be easier to cut, shape and file as it
will be relatively soft. However, the industrial
heat treatment of steel is a very complex and
precise science.
• In a school workshop most heat treatment of
metals takes place on a brazing hearth. A
rotating table and fire bricks are essential. The
fire bricks reflect the intense heat back on to
the metal being heated. This is achieved by
arranging the bricks in a semi-circle behind
the metal being heated. Without the bricks,
heat would escape and this would limit the
temperature that could be reached.
• Heat treatment of steel in a school workshop is
normally a two stage process. For example, if a
high carbon steel or silver steel screw driver
blade has been manufactured, at some point it
will have to be ‘’hardened’ to prevent it wearing
down when used. On the other hand it will have
to be ‘tempered’. This second heating process
reduces the hardness a little but toughens the
steel. It also significantly reduces the brittleness
of the steel so that it does not break easily. The
whole process is called ‘hardening and
tempering’.
STAGE ONE:
• The screw driver blade is heated, slowly at
first, warming up the whole blade. Then the
heat is concentrated on the area at the end of
the blade. This gradually becomes ‘red’ hot.
STAGE TWO:
• The screw driver blade is removed quickly
from the brazing heart, with blacksmiths tongs
and plunged into clean, cold water. Steam
boils off from the water as the steel cools
rapidly. At this stage the blade is very hard but
brittle and will break easily.
STAGE THREE:
• The screw driver blade is cleaned with emery
cloth and heated again on the brazing hearth.
Heat is concentrated at the end of the steel
blade. The steel must be watched very carefully
as it changes color quite quickly. A blue line of
heat will appear near the end of the blade and it
travels towards the tip as the temperature rises
along the blade. When the line of blue reaches
the tip the brazing torch is turned off. The blue
indicates the correct temperature of ‘tempering’.
STAGE FOUR:
• The screw driver blade is placed on a steel
surface, such as an anvil face. This conducts
the heat away and allows slow cooling of the
screw driver blade. When cold, the blade
should be tough and hard wearing and
unlikely to break or snap. This is due to the
tempering process.
• When heating steel on the brazing hearth,
color changes take place. These can be used to
indicate the temperature of the metal. The
table opposite is a rough guide.
• The table opposite shows the temperatures
and the associated colors required when
tempering steel for particular uses. For
instance, when making wood turning tools,
they must be heated to a brown color, whilst
tempering.
 Annealing
• Annealing is a heat process whereby a metal is
heated to a specific temperature /colour and
then allowed to cool slowly. This softens the
metal which means it can be cut and shaped
more easily. Mild steel, is heated to a red heat
and allowed to cool slowly. However, metals
such as aluminium will melt if heated for too
long.
• Aluminium can be annealed but care must be
taken whilst heating. The flame should be held at
a distance to the aluminium so that it gives a
generalised heating to the metal.
• A ‘trick of the trade’ is to rub soap on to the
surface of the aluminium and then heat it on the
brazing hearth. It takes only a short time for the
soap to turn black. The brazing torch should be
turned off immediately and the aluminium
allowed to cool slowly. It is now annealed and
should be very soft and malleable.
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES: Annealed metals
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES: Hardened metals are
are relatively soft and can be cut and
difficult to cut and shape. They are very
shaped more easily. They bend easily
difficult if not impossible to bend. As a rule
when pressure is applied. As a rule they
they are heated and cooled very quickly by
are heated and allowed to cool slowly.
quenching in clean, cold water.
The animation above shows that an
The animation above shows that metals that
annealed metal is usually softer and can be
have not been annealed are very difficult to
deformed more easily than metals that are
deform.
not annealed.
 Heat Treatment - Normalizing
• Normalizing is a heat treatment process for making
material softer but does not produce the uniform
material properties of annealing.. A material can be
normalized by heating it to a specific temperature
and then letting the material cool to room
temperature outside of the oven. This treatment
refines the grain size and improves the uniformity of
microstructure and properties of hot rolled steel.
• Normalizing is used in some plate mills, in the
production of large forgings such as railroad
wheels and axles, some bar products. This
process is less expensive than annealing.
 Heat Treatment - Stress Relieving
• It consists of heating the steel to a temperature below
the critical range to relieve the stresses resulting from
cold working, shearing, or gas cutting. It is not
intended to alter the microstructure or mechanical
properties significantly also a process for making
material softer. However stress relieving does not
change the material properties as does annealing and
normalizing. A material can be stress relieved by
heating it to a specific temperature that is lower than
that of annealing or normalizing and letting it cool to
room temperature inside or outside of the oven. This
heat treatment is typically used on parts that have
been severely stressed during fabrication.
• It is worth noting that many heat treatments and
welding processes cause stresses in the material that
can lead to warpage either after the heat treating
process or during subsequent machining operations.
• Of specific concern is the stress induced by welding. If
a weldment is to be machined it should almost always
be stress relieved or normalized before the machining
process. This is because machining chunks of material
from a stressed weldment redistributes the internal
stresses and can cause the part to warp. If the stresses
are first relaxed then abrupt changes in geometry after
machining are reduced.
 Heat Treatment - Quenching
• Quenching is the process for making material
harder. This method has been known for
hundreds of years but was only perfected in
the last century. The metal is heated to a
specific temperature and rapidly cooled
(quenched) in a bath of water, brine, oil, or air
to increase its hardness.
• One drawback of using this method by itself is
that the metal becomes brittle. This treatment is
therefore typically followed by a tempering
process which is a heating process at another
lower specific temperature to stress relieve the
material and minimize the brittleness problem.
The temperature chosen for the tempering
process directly impacts the hardness of the work
piece . The higher the temperature in the
tempering process, the lower the hardness.
 Carburising
• Carburizing is a process of controlled diffusion of
carbon into the surface of a component, followed by
quenching and tempering, with the objective of
increasing the component’s surface hardness. The
process is generally applicable to low carbon steels.
When conducted in a "conventional", rather than in
a vacuum furnace, we can refer to the process as
conventional carburizing.
• In this thermal process ferrous alloys are heated to
above their transformation temperature and
exposed to carbon rich medium. Processing
temperatures fall in the 1450°F - 1900°F (790°C -
1040°C) range. The diffusion of carbon into the part
and the subsequent quench leads to a part with a
hard, wear resistant surface and a tough shock
resistant core.
 Nitriding
• Carbonitriding is a process similar to
carburizing whereby ammonia is added to the
carburizing atmosphere, which results in
supplementary nitrogen diffusion into the
surface of a treated component.

Note: carbonitriding is sometimes confused

with nitrocarburizing
• Nitrogen diffusion (nitriding) and boron diffusion
(boronising or boriding) both produce hard
intermetallic compounds at the surface. These
layers are intrinsically hard and do not need heat
treatment themselves.
• Nitrogen diffusion (nitriding) is often carried out
at or below the tempering temperature of the
steels used. Hence they can be hardened prior to
nitriding and the nitriding can also be used as a
temper.
 Boronising
• Boronizing is a thermochemical surface-
hardening process in which boron atoms are
diffused into the surface of a work piece to
form complex borides (such as FeB/FeB2) with
the base metal.
• There is no mechanical interface between the
complex borides and the substrate, as this is a
true diffusion process. The resulting case layer
has a hard, slippery surface capable of
performing at higher temperatures than most
surface treatments. Practically any ferrous
material can be boronized, as well as many nickel,
titanium & cobalt alloys. However, it is important
to note, the higher the content of alloy elements,
the slower the diffusion rate.
• Boronizing is used to improve the life and
performance of metal components. The boronizing
process:
– Strengthens resistance to corrosion
– Strengthens resistance to acid
– Strengthens resistance to abrasive wear
– Decreases coefficient of friction
– Increases surface hardness
• Examples of applications include pumps,
valves, and impellers. Extremely heavy
abrasion and erosion resistance properties
make it suitable for the oil, mining, and
agricultural industries.
• Boronizing is also known as boriding.
 Case Hardening
• Case hardening or surface hardening is the process of
hardening the surface of a metal object while allowing
the metal deeper underneath to remain soft, thus
forming a thin layer of harder metal (called the "case")
at the surface. For steel or iron with low carbon
content, which has poor to no hardenability of its own,
the case hardening process involves infusing additional
carbon into the case. Case hardening is usually done
after the part has been formed into its final shape, but
can also be done to increase the hardening element
content of bars to be used in a pattern welding or
similar process.
 Induction Hardening
• Induction hardening is a process used for the
surface hardening of steel and other alloy
components. The parts to be heat treated are
placed inside a water cooled copper coil and then
heated above their transformation temperature
by applying an alternating current to the coil. The
alternating current in the coil induces an
alternating magnetic field within the work piece,
which if made from steel, caused the outer
surface of the part to heat to a temperature
above the transformation range.
• Parts are held at that temperature until the
appropriate depth of hardening has been
achieved, and then quenched in oil, or
another media, depending upon the steel type
and hardness desired. The core of the
component remains unaffected by the
treatment and its physical properties are
those of the bar from which it was machined
or preheat treated. The hardness of the case
can be HRC 37 - 58.
• Carbon and alloy steels with a carbon content
in the range 0.40 - 0.45% are most suitable for
this process. In some cases, parts made from
alloy steels such as 4320, 8620 or 9310, like
steel and paper mill rolls, are first carburized
to a required case depth and slow cooled, and
then induction hardened. This is to realize the
benefit of relatively high core mechanical
properties, and surface hardness greater than
HRC 60, which provides excellent protection.
• While induction hardening is most commonly
used for steel parts, other alloys such as
copper alloys, which are solution treated and
tempered, may be induction hardened as well.
Applications include hardening bearing races,
gears, pinion shafts, crane (and other) wheels
and treads, and threaded pipe used for oil
patch drilling
 Induction Flame Hardening
• Flame hardening is similar to induction
hardening, in that it is a surface hardening
process. Heat is applied to the part being
hardened, using an oxy- acetylene (or similar
gas) flame on the surface of the steel being
hardened and heating the surface above the
upper critical temperature before quenching
the steel in a spray of water. The result is a
hard surface layer ranging from 0.050" to
0.250" deep.
• As with induction hardening, the steel
component must have sufficient carbon
(greater than 0.35%). The composition of the
steel is not changed; therefore core
mechanical properties are unaffected. Flame
hardening produces results similar to
conventional hardening processes but with
less hardness penetration.
• Applications for flame hardening are similar to
those for induction hardening, although an
advantage of flame hardening is the ability to
harden flat surfaces. Flat wear plates, and
knives can be selectively hardened using this
process.
 Cyaniding
• A process in which an iron-base alloy is heated
in contact with a cyanide salt so that the
surface absorbs carbon and nitrogen.
Cyaniding is followed by quenching and
tempering to produce a case with a desired
combination of hardness and toughness.