Medium-manganese steels processed by austenite-reverted-transformation annealing for automotive applications

In the automotive industry, the current development trend of lightweight and low-emission vehicles requests for high-performance materials. Benefiting from an excellent balance of mechanical properties and production cost, medium-Mn steels have attracted extensive interest by materials scientists. Austenite-reverted-transformation annealing plays a vital role in stabilisation of retained austenite and grain refinement, resulting in a considerable amount of retained austenite. Localised deformation phenomenon is usually observed in the ultrafine-grained medium-Mn steels owing to the absence of strain hardening. The occurrence of transformation-inducedplasticity and/ or twinning-induced-plasticity effect in austenite improves strain hardening effectively. In the current review, austenite-reverted-transformation annealing treatment routine, mechanical properties and deformation mechanisms and effect of heat treatment on microstructure and mechanical properties of medium-Mn steels are summarised.