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Carbide refining heat treatments for 52100 bearing steel

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Abstract

The life of through-hardened 52100 anti-friction bearing components is improved if the excess carbides, undissolved during austenitization, are small and uniformly dispersed. One kind of carbide-refining heat treatment consists of 1) dissolving all carbides, 2) isothermally transforming the austenite to pearlite or bainite, and 3) austenitizing, quenching and tempering in the usual manner. Each step in this sequence of treatments was investigated, and the behavior of pearlitic and bainitic microstructures during subsequent austenitization was contrasted with the behavior of ferrite/spheroidized-carbide microstructures. It was shown that: 1) The usual hardening treatments given spheroidize-annealed bearing components result in an inhomogeneous microstructure, possibly due to the faster dissolution of carbides near austenite grain boundaries. 2) Austenitization of pearlite or bainite produces very uniform dispersions of ultra-fine carbides on the order of 0.1 µm diameter or less. 3) Specimens with ultra-fine carbides tend to have more retained austenite. 4) The rate of coarsening of ultra-fine carbides at austenitizing temperatures of 840°C and below, is slow enough so that conventional furnace heat treatments are satisfactory for producing this microstructure.

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  1. Ford Motor Co., 48121, Dearborn, Mich

    C. A. Stickels (Member ofe the Process Research Department, Scientific Research Staff)

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  1. C. A. Stickels
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Stickels, C.A. Carbide refining heat treatments for 52100 bearing steel. Metall Trans 5, 865–874 (1974). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02643140

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02643140

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