Steel Selection Criteria

Variables, and how to meet the requirements

Material selection involves:
Consideration of melting practices,
Forming methods,
Machining operations,
Heat treating procedures,
Deterioration of properties with time
in service,
The conventional mechanical and
chemical properties of the steel to be
forged.
Material Selection Criteria
Reasons for Heat Treatment
Heat Treatment
Variables Raw Materials
a. Cleanness
b. Alloy selection
c. Alloy Design
d. Formability
e. Machinability
f. Chemistry / Hardenability control
g. Strength / Toughness
h. Fatigue Strength
i. Inclusion Engineering
j. Surface Quality
k. Dimensional Quality
l. Price / Delivery
"Obstacles are those frightful things you can see when you take your
eyes off your goal." - Henry Ford
 Variables Product Design Aspect

a.Intrinsic (Natural) Validity of the Design

b.Loading what type of loading?
c.Applied Stresses to what extent the
product can withstand?
d.Residual Stresses to what extent
allowed
e.Process Selection

"You will never find time for anything. You must make it." -
Charles Buxton
 1.Heat Treatment
a.Case / core properties
b.Type: Carburize / Nitride /
Induction harden
c.Inter Granular Oxidation control
d.Non Martensitic Transformation
Products control
2.Distortion Control

Variables Product Processing

1. Residual stresses
a. Heat Treatment
b. Shot peening
2. Geometric / Contour control
3. Surface finish
a. Grinding
b. Polishing
c. Peening
4. Surface treatments / coatings

Variables Product Processing

 Each type of microstructure and product is developed to the
characteristic property ranges by specific processing routes that
control and exploit microstructural changes.
Processing technologies not only depend on microstructure but
are also used to tailor final microstructures.
For example, sheet steel formability depends on the single-phase
ferritic microstructures of low-carbon cold-rolled and annealed
steel,
High strength and wear resistance are enhanced by carefully
developed microstructures of very fine carbides in fine
martensite in fine-grain austenite of high-carbon hardened steels.

Microstructure Vs Properties
 Variables Product Applications
a. Lubricant type
a. Base
b. Viscosity
c. Temperature / Oxidation stability
d. Additives
b. Lambda Ratio (air Fuel Ratio)
c. Contamination
a. Chemical
b. Mechanical
c. electrical
"There is no one giant step that does it. It's a lot of little steps."
- Peter A. Cohen
 Product Service conditions
What are the rigors of the application, and what is the
design life?
Must it provide premier service, or is there an adequate
design life that is involved (i.e. other factors will end its
service long before its useful life is expended)?
What are loading, lubricants, temperature and
contaminants involved?
Other service/performance aspects specific to a particular
product must also be factored into the selection process.

"What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve." -
Napoleon Hill
 Manufacturing Processes
How is the component to be made (i.e. process
requirements)?
How will its basic form be generated, and how will it be heat
treated (if at all)?
How particular mechanical properties are to be achieved - by
heat treatment or mechanical means?
Is geometry or surface finish important,
Will special coatings be used, is dimensional control (stability or
stability at temperature) an issue?
Other processing aspects specific to a particular product must
also be considered.
"Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance."
- Samuel Johnson
Material grade
Variation in material properties (chemistry, homogeneity,
grain size, number and type of inclusions, and
hardenability)
Part orientation Vs grain orientation
Starting microstructure
Heat treatments performed at the mill (dozens of variables)
Manufacturing process and sequence of operations
Residual stress state (from manufacturing)
Heat treatment after component manufacturing (dozens of
variables)
Hardness range (initial, final)

Variables - Dimensional Change

 Variables Related to Heat Treating

Type of process selected (annealing, hardening,

nitriding, carburizing, etc.)
High-heat process (anneal, normalize, austenitize),
temperature and soak times
Low-heat process (age, temper, stress relief),
temperature and soak times
Furnace temperature uniformity
Furnace repeatability
Quenchant type
Quench rate

"You just can't beat the person who never gives up." - Babe Ruth
Variables in Heat Treatment
Part size
Load size
Load configuration
Part orientation/fixturing
Type of furnace atmosphere
Deep freezing or cryogenic processing
Number of tempering cycles
Carbon content, Phases and
Hardnesses
Dimensional Change Examples
Effects of heat treatment on size change.
The effects are different for every material grade.
For example, a 3.15-inch cube of D-2 tool steel
during hardening grew by 0.08% in one dimension,
while shrinking in the other two dimensions.
In this instance, the problem boiled down to knowing
the part orientation from the mill-supplied bar, which
was important in trying to plan for size change during
heat treatment..
In another example, slitter blades of D-2 tool steel are
notorious for size change during tempering and can shrink or
grow depending on the tempering temperature.
D-2 is a transformation-hardening tool steel that requires both a
hardening and tempering step during the heat-treating process.
The dimensional changes on hardening and tempering must be
added together when trying to estimate total size change.
Final part hardness is determined by tempering temperature,
and the hardness requested by the drawing specification or end-
user may have a drastic effect on size change since it dictates
final tempering temperature

Dimensional Change Examples

Size-Change Examples
Example: Latrobe Steel data sheet,
Steel: 17-4 precipitation-hardening stainless steel
Can typically be expected to shrink by 0.0004-
0.0006 inch/inch when aging from Condition A to
Condition H-900; and
0.0018-0.0022 inch/inch when aging from Condition
A to Condition H-1150.
Selection of a steel for a forged component is an integral
part of the design process, and acceptable performance is
dependent on this choice.
A thorough understanding of the end use of the finished
part will serve to define the required mechanical
properties, surface finish requirements, tolerance to
nonmetallic inclusions, and the attendant inspection
methods and criteria.
Forging quality steels are produced to a wide range of
chemical compositions by electric furnace and open
hearth steelmaking processes.
With each of the melting and rolling practices, a level of
testing and evaluation of quality is exercised.

Selection of steels for forgings

 While ordering raw material for forging, one should consider
testing and quality evaluation methods used by the producer.
These methods normally vary from producer to producer.
The designer may specify, one or more special quality
restrictions.
These will introduce additional qualification testing by the
producing mill.
It may be necessary to specify vacuum arc remelt or electroslag
remelt steel for High-strength alloy steels, because of their
intolerance to inclusions, require high level of refinement to
reduce the occurrence of nonmetallics for higher-reliability
applications.

Selection of steels for forgings

 Forgeability is the relative ability of a steel to flow under
compressive loading without fracturing.
Except for resulfurized and rephosphorized grades, most carbon
and low-alloy steels have good forgeability.
Differences in forging behavior among the various grades of
steel are small enough that selection of the steel is seldom
affected by forging behavior.
Choice of a resulfurized or rephosphorized steel for a forging is
justified only if the forging is to be extensively machined;
because one of the principal reasons for considering
manufacture by forging is the avoidance of subsequent
machining operations, this situation is not so common

Selection of Steels -Forgeability

 The selection of a steel for a forged part usually
requires some compromise between opposing
factors--for example:
Strength versus toughness,
Stress-corrosion resistance versus weight,
manufacturing cost versus useful load-carrying
ability,
Production cost versus maintenance cost,
The cost of the steel raw material versus the total
manufacturing cost of the forging.

Steel Selection Design requirements

Uniaxial loads:
Tensile or compressive, or reversible with changes in
operating conditions
Multiaxial or combined loads:
Tensile, compressive, shear, bending, torsion, and
bearing.
Can be either parallel to a central axis or at an angle.
Stress concentration should be minimized in design by
specifying smooth, contoured fillets at changes of
configuration.
Where stress concentration cannot be avoided, notch
toughness is usually important in material selection.

Service Conditions - Loading Pattern

Cyclic loads:
These can be either high- or low-cycle loads.
Sustained loads:
If these loads are tensile, they may accelerate stress
corrosion. Interference fits and residual stresses may
give rise to sustained loading.
Thermal loads:
These are caused by changes in temperature

Loading Pattern
 Magnitudes
Rate of load application. Gradual or impact
Temperature. The major time accumulations
should be estimated for minimum, normal, and
maximum temperatures.
Environment. Cyclic periods of atmospheric
condensation, chemical composition of
environment, circumstances of corrosion,
abrasion, erosion, or other wear

Load magnitudes and

conditions of loading
Service life, including downtime, should be
estimated.
Reparability should be considered.
Special mechanical, physical, or chemical
requirements, if any

Life expectancy or reliability

Failure analyses are a useful data source for matching
the properties of steels to requirements.
Failure of a component can occur during operation
within the design stress range.
One cause of premature failure is lack of proper
orientation of a critical design stress with the preferred
grain flow of a forging

Failure Analysis and Design

Unpredicted failure may also occur because of the
deterioration of properties with time and service.
Failure analyses may uncover other causes of
premature failure, such as:
excessive grain growth,
inclusions of nonmetallic impurities, g
rain flow folding from improper forging practice,
lack of a wrought metallurgical structure, and
the inadvertent production of stress raisers by
machining to an overly sharp fillet or by poor fit in
assembly.

Failure Analysis and Design

Other processing characteristics likely to influence
fabricability and finished-part costs should be
considered when selecting steel for forgings.
Most forgings require some machining, so the
machining characteristics of the steel chosen may be
a pertinent cost factor.
Depending on mechanical property requirements,
response to heat treatment may also be expected to
affect costs.

Processing Methods
The lower-alloy steels such as 4023, 5120, 4118, 8620, and
4620, with a carbon range between 0.15 and 0.25%, are widely
used for gears.
The first choice usually would be made from the last two steels
mentioned, either of which should be safe for all ordinary
applications.
Gears are almost always oil quenched because distortion must
be held to the lowest possible level.
This means that alloy steels are usually selected--which
particular alloy is to be used - is much debated.

Example of material selection

 The final choice, demanded by the need to be the least
expensive steel that will do the job, is based on service
experience or dynamometer testing,
Steel grade1524, although not classified commercially as an
alloy steel, has sufficient manganese to make it oil hardening
up to an end-quench correlation point of 3 /16 and may be
included in the list of steels used in gear manufacturing.
For heavy-duty applications, higher-alloy grades such as
4320, 4817, and 9310 are justifiable if based on actual
performance tests.
It is important to carry out the life testing of gears in the
same mountings used in service to prove both the design and
the steel selection.

Example of material selection

The carbonitriding process extends the use of carbon
steels such as 1016, 1018, 1019, and 1022 into the field of
light-duty gearing by permitting the use of oil quenching
in teeth of eight diametric pitch and finer.
Steels selected for such applications should be specified
as silicon-killed fine-grain in order to ensure uniform case
hardness and dimensional control.
The core of such gears will, of course, have the properties
of low-carbon steel, oil quenched. In the thin sections of
fine-pitch teeth, this may be up to 25 HRC.

Example of material selection

The carbonitriding process is usually limited, for
economic reasons, to maximum case depths of
approximately 0.6 mm (0.025 in.).
Non-gear Applications. In other applications, when
distortion is not a major factor, the carbon steels described
above, water quenched, can be used up to a 50 mm (2 in.)
diameter.
In larger sizes, low-alloy steels, water quenched, such as
5120, 4023, and 6120, can be used, but possible distortion
and quench cracking must be guarded against.

Example of material selection