Fatigue Properties of a Low-Alloy Steel with a Nano-Structured Surface Layer Obtained by Severe Mechanical Treatments

Abstract:

Recent development in mechanical technologies and processes have shown that by performing traditional mechanical treatments with unusual and severe parameters it is possible to obtain metal surfaces characterized by grain size with dimension in the order of 50-100 nm. This confers peculiar and superior properties to the surface layer of material. Since the surface is the usual point of fatigue crack initiation it is expected that the parts treated this way show a better fatigue behavior with respect to the coarse grain materials, even if treated with conventional mechanical treatments. This work explores any opportunities to obtain nano-structured surface layers by means of two popular mechanical treatments, shot peening and deep rolling. To this end particularly severe processing parameters are applied on a low alloy steel fatigue test specimens. The treated surface is characterized by means of optical Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), X-ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis of residual stress and roughness measurements. In the end a series of fatigue tests on smooth specimens severely treated, conventionally treated and not treated were executed. The results show the potential benefits of severe mechanical treatments and were interpreted in the light of peculiar effects of these novel treatments on the characteristics of the treated surfaces.