Effect of initial microstructure on the work hardening behavior of plain eutectoid steel

Work hardening capability and tensile properties of the plain eutectoid steel rods are the key factors in the wire drawing process to fabricate high strength wire rods with a minimum failure. In the present research, the work hardening behavior of eutectoid steel with different initial microstructures of bainite, duplex bainite+pearlite, pearlite, partially spheroidized and spheroidized pearlite was assessed in terms of instantaneous work hardening exponent (n value) and work hardening rate (theta) using room temperature tensile test. The results show an inverse parabolic behavior for variation of instantaneous n value versus true strain, i.e., work hardening exponent initially increases up to a maximum value and then decreases. The bainitic microstructure exhibits the lowest n value, whereas the spheroidized pearlitic one shows the highest. It is shown that the fine pearlitic microstructure containing partially spheroidized regions exhibited the best combination of tensile properties, n value and work hardening rate. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.