Fabricating interstitial-free steel with simultaneous high strength and good ductility with homogeneous layer and lamella structure

Annealed interstitial-free steel (IF steel) and deformed IF steel sheets were stacked alternatively into multi-layers to produce laminated IF steel through thermal-mechanical processing. After proper processing, a yield strength of 500 MPa, an ultimate tensile strength of 600 MPa (comparable to cold rolled one) and a uniform elongation around 17% can be realized. Microstructural observation by electron back-scatter diffraction revealed a characteristic hierarchical layer + heterogeneous lamella structure, namely L2 structure. The reasons for the good mechanical properties were discussed. (C) 2017 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.