Nucleation Laws of Supercooled Austenite Transformation

Abstract

It is significant theoretically to study the nucleation laws of the phase transformation products of the supercooled austenite. The different iron and steel materials were used to study the nucleation of pearlite, bainite and martensite by QUANTA-400 environmental scanning electron microscope and JEM-2100 transmission electron microscope. The results show that, from the high-temperature zone to the low-temperature zone, the nucleation of the transformation products of the supercooled austenite is a gradually evolutionary process from two-phase nucleation to single-phase nucleation. Pearlite nucleates in the austenitic grain boundary, bainite nucleates preferentially in the grain boundary and sometimes in the grain interior and martensite nucleates preferentially in the interface and generally in the grain interior. The preferential nucleation sites are the interface, and with the decrease of the transformation temperature, they gradually shift to the defects in the grain interiors, which accord with the general rules of the phase transformation nucleation.