Shortening the Duration of Heat Treatment in the Lower Bainitic Range

In many cases an isothermal treatment of throughhardening bearing grades in the lower bainitic range allows to adjust the mechanical properties of machine components to the later application, similar to those of martensitic hardening. The achieved microstructure contains only a negligible amount of retained austenite, so a dimensional change of components during application can be reduced. One disadvantage of the isothermal bainitic treatment in salt bath is that the duration of the treatment is much longer than that of the martensitic hardening and this causes higher costs. Therefore it would be desirable to be able to shorten the transformation duration in the lower bainitic range. The aim of the present work is to determine the parameters, by which the process could be greatly shortened in comparison with the conventional transformation process in the lower bainitic range. Therefore the bainitic transformation behavior of the steel 100 Cr6 (SAE 52100) and the relevant influence factors were investigated by means of dilatometry, in which the heat treatments were carried out with different process variants including pre-quenching or post-quenching. The amount of retained austenite in the microstructure and the hardness of the steel after the shortened heat treatments were measured. Finally the possibility to use these processes in industrial production is discussed.