Enhancing Wear Resistance of 100Cr6 Bearing Steels by New Heat Treatment Method

The typical final microstructure of bearing steels is composed of coarse carbides in a martensitic matrix due to coarse carbides in the initial microstructure obtained by the soft annealing. In this work, the effect of the initial microstructure on the final microstructure and wear performance of bearing steels was studied. In dilatometer experiments, the effect of different initial microstructures on the phase transformations was examined through the hardening at 840 °C. The wear tests were performed using a ball-on-disk tribometer. Microstructural characterization and hardness test have been carried out after the wear testing. The results showed that martensitic and bainitic initial microstructures markedly reduce the size of carbides in the final microstructure. The new heat treatment method for bearing steels meets higher hardness and outstanding resistance against wear owing to finer carbides in the final microstructure.