Mechanical Properties of Low Carbon Steel Processed by Equal Channel Angular Pressing
AbstractLow carbon steels have been gained special attention for being used in transportation industries like automotive and railway sectors. Improving the mechanical properties of low carbon steels in any manner may decrease the total weight of the vehicles and structures and thus reduce the fuel consumption. Although mechanical properties of low carbon steels can be optimized by heat treatment, severe plastic deformation (SPD) techniques based on imposing very high strain to the material provide much more increase in the strength values of them. Therefore, low carbon grade-A steel was processed via equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) known as one of the most commonly used SPD method. ECAP did not cause considerable decrease in the grain size of the steel, but it increased hardness and strength values significantly due to the increase in the dislocation density in the microstructure. On the other hand ductility of the steel decreased after ECAP process. Impact energy of the ECAP-processed sample was found to be dependent on the notch position of the Charpy impact test sample.