Abstract
Abstract In practice the thermal stability of high-speed steels is assessed by simple hardness tests. As high-speed steels can be seen as a composite material of a particle-strengthened metallic matrix and coarse primary carbides, the measured hardness is a mixture of both microstructural constituents. Whereas the primary carbides do not change during tempering, the particle-strengthened matrix is prone to microstructural changes, thus affecting the mechanical properties. Consequently, characterization methods which are sensitive only to the matrix have to be applied. In this study single-peak profile analysis were carried out to investigate the thermal stability of high-speed steel matrices. By applying this method the lattice distortion was obtained and compared to classical hardness tests. In a first step, the applicability of this method was investigated. Afterwards, four different high-speed steels were analyzed. The investigations showed that the distortion of the lattice of the matrix depends on their microstructure and composition, which both depend on the heat treatment history. The observed differences in hardness can be correlated to differences in lattice distortion of the matrix and the present amount of primary carbides.
Published Version
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