Abstract
This chapter describes the kinetics of displacive transformations. The most important displacive transformation is the one that happens in carbon steels. It is found that if one takes a piece of 0.8% carbon steel off the shelf and measures its mechanical properties, one will find, roughly, the values of hardness, tensile strength, and ductility. It is observed that if one test a piece that has been heated to red heat and then quenched into cold water, one will find a dramatic increase in hardness and a big decrease in ductility. The two samples have such divergent mechanical properties because they have radically different structures and the structure of the as-received steel is shaped by a diffusive transformation, but the structure of the quenched steel is shaped by a displacive change. There are strong parallels between displacive transformations and plastic deformation. Both happen almost instantaneously at speeds that are limited by the propagation of lattice vibrations through the crystal.
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