The Influence of Thermomechanical Treatment of TRIP Steel on its Final Microstructure

Higher demands are currently being made on material properties and their combinations, for example, high strength steel with good cold formability. With increasing strength, material formability generally worsens, but with some kinds of steels, for example, with TRIP steel, it is possible to obtain an excellent combination of strength and ductility. However, these materials are interesting not only for use as sheets but also for other applications. Semi-products with thin walls represent the best way of further extending TRIP steels into the bulk forming area. This trend supposes that suitable technological conditions will be found and the process for a chosen production procedure will be optimized. The model optimization of the process for TMT with incremental deformations was experimentally carried out on a thermomechanical simulating machine. Microstructures obtained by the model treatment were analyzed by means of optical and electron microscopy.