13th Scientific/Research Symposium with International Participation

„METALLIC AND NONMETALLIC MATERIALS“, B&H, 27th May 2021

EFFECT OF HEAT TREATMENT ON MICROSTRUCTURE AND

HARDNESS OF STEEL 67SiCr5

Almaida Gigović-Gekić, Jusuf Duraković, Hasan Avdušinović

University of Zenica, Faculty of Metallurgy and Technology
Zenica
Bosnia and Herzegovina

Key words: springs steel, heat treatment, microstructure, hardness, decarburization

ABSTRACT
Steel 67SiCr5 is a alloyed carbon steel usually used for production of springs. It is used for load bearing
springs, ring-shape springs, spiral springs, anti vibration springs etc. Springs steels are usually distribute
in annealed or hardened and tempered state. Heat treating could be performed before or after springs
forming. In this article, the results of influence of different form of heat treatment on microstructure and
hardness are presented. Heat treatments like annealing (normalizing and soft annealing), hardening and
tempering are carried out in atmospheric condition. From the results could be seen that in opposite of
annealing the hardening treatment improves hardness of the material. Tempering process decreases
hardness but it still higher than in the case of annealing. Microstructural analysis shows that temperature
of heat treatment and a cooling rate had very important influence on microstructure. Also, a presence of
a decarburization was noticed.

1. INTRODUCTION
Springs are important structural parts using for many purposes as to absorb the shocks or
vibration, to measure the forces, to store the energy, control the motion, to return a component to
its original position after displacement, to permit some freedom of movement between aligned
components without disengaging them etc. The main requirements for springs materials are high
elasticity limit, high ultimate strain, good creep rupture strength, ductility, good deformability in
hot and cold state, quality surface, cleanliness of steel and low surface decarburization during
heat treatment. Steel alloys are the most commonly used spring materials. The most popular
alloys include high-carbon, alloy steels and stainless steels. High carbon spring steels are the
most commonly used material because it is less expensive, it can be easily worked and it is
readily available. These steels are not suitable for springs operating at high or low temperatures
or for shock or impact loading [1]. Alloy steels are alloyed with silicone, manganese, chromium,
vanadium, molybdenum and nickel. Steel 67SiCr5 is the springs steel alloyed with silicon and
chromium. Chrome-silicon steel is an excellent spring material for highly stressed springs
requiring long life and/or shock loading resistance and can be used from temperatures up to 300
0
C.Silicon increases hardenability, wear resistance, elastic limit and yield strength and scale
resistance in heat resistant steels but decreases resistance to decarburization. Addition of
chromium in steels enhances hardenability, corrosion and oxidation resistance. Mechanical and
metallurgical properties of the steels as well as the springs steels could be changed by cold work
or heat treatment. Usually applied heat treatment processes for the springs are soft annealing,
normalizing, hardening and tempering. Soft annealing is usually used in the case of difficult
shaping operation which involves cold working (cold coiling, cutting, stamping...). Normalizing
may be necessary if the spring is exposed to high stresses and in such cases where day cause
difficulties when shaped [2]. The quenched and tempered condition gives to spring steels
optimum strength, toughness and vibration damping. If there is requirement for impact
resistance, the springs should have better hardenability i.e. a content of martensite in center
should be about 80 to 90%.For this reason, the standards prescribe the maximum dimension for
individual types of steel [3].

In this work, the influence of heat treatment on microstructure and hardness of springs steel
67SiCr5 are presented. The change in microstructure and hardness after the heat treatment
process depends of the temperature of heat treatment and cooling rate.

2. EXPERIMENTAL PART
Material tested in this work was the springs steel 67SiCr5 with a chemical composition and
mechanical properties have given in Table 1 and 2.

Table 1. Chemical composition of EN 67SiCr5 [4]

Chemical composition, wt.%
Steel
C Si Mn P S Cr
67SiCr5 0.62-0.72 1.20-1.40 0.40-0.60 0.035 0.035 0.20-0.40

Table 2.Mechanical properties of EN 67SiCr5 [4]

Mechanical properties
Steel
Rp0.2, MPa Rm,MPa KV/KU, J A, % Z, % HBW
67SiCr5 192 (≥) 797 (≥) 13 13 33 322

The analysis of a microstructure and hardness were done for a initial state and the seven heat
treated samples. All the heat treated samples are heated in an electric furnace without a
protection atmosphere and together with furnace from the room temperature. Processes of the
heat treatments(normalizing, soft annealing, hardening and tempering) are described in Table 3
and Figure 1.
Table 3. Heat treatment of the springs steel 67SiCr5
Sample Heat treatment
Sample 1 No heat treating, initial state
Sample 2 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in air
Sample 3 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in furnace
Sample 4 continuous heating at 650 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in furnace
Sample 5 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in water
Sample 6 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in oil
Sample 7 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in water/
continuous heating at 400 0C/ soaking 5 minutes/cooling in air
Sample 8 continuous heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in oil/
continuous heating at 400 0C/ soaking 5 minutes/cooling in air
 a) b)
Figure 1. Technology of the heat treatment: a) for Sample 2,3 and 4, b) for Sample 5, 6, 7 and 8.

Before analysis of microstructure the samples were prepared by grinding, polishing and etching
by Nital (HNO3 + ethanol). The microstructural analysis was carried out by theOlympus optical
microscope with maximum magnification of x1000. Hardness test, according to standard BAS
EN ISO 6507-1:2018, were performed on specimens prepared for microstructure analysis.
Estimating of the depth of decarburization was done according to standard ASTM E 1077-01 (R
2005) and BAS EN ISO 6507-1:2018.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Analysis of microstructure
The microstructure of the heat treated samples and the initial state are shown in Figures 2-5. All
samples showed fine grained microstructure.

a) b)
Figure 2. The microstructure of: a) Sample 1 (the initial state) and b) Sample 2 (heating at 850
0
C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in air), x1000
Analysis the initial state showed that the spring steel 67SiCr5 was delivered in the heat treated
state. A soft annealed microstructure was found, with the perlite being formed in a globular form
i.e. in the form of spherical carbide particles in the ferrite matrix, Figure 2.a. The same
microstructure was obtained in the case of the soft annealing at 650 0C too, Figure 3.b. The
cooling rate after the normalizing at 850 0C had very important influence on the microstructure
of steel. After cooling in the air the microstructure was a bainite (Figure 2.b.), while product of
cooling in furnace was ferrite-pearlite microstructure (Figure 3.a.). The ferrite-pearlite
microstructurepresents the mixture of the carbide particles in the globular form and lamelar form
in the ferrite matrix.

a) b)
0
Figure 3. The microstructure of: a) Sample 3 (heating at 850 C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in furnace)
andb) Sample 4 (heating at 650 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling in furnace), x1000

After quenching in oil the microstructure was bainite (Figure 4.b) while the microstructure after
cooling in water (Figure 4.a) was martensite with bainite because the cooling rate was faster.

a) b)
Figure 4. The microstructure of: a) Sample 5 (heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in
water) and b) Sample 6 (heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in oil, x1000

During tempering the resulting microstructure contains bainite or carbides in the matrix of
ferrite, Figure 5.a and b.
 a) b)
Figure 5. The microstructure of: a) Sample 7 (heating at 850 0C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in
water/ continuous heating at 400 0C/ soaking 5 minutes/cooling in air) and b) Sample 8 (heating at 850
0
C/soaking 5 minutes/cooling (quenching) in oil/ continuous heating at 400 0C/ soaking 5 minutes/cooling
in air), x1000

The analysis of all heat treated samples (except of the soft annealed sample) showed
decarburization on the surface, Figure 6. Reason for decarburization was not using a protection
atmosphere in the furnace during the heat treatment. Also, the silicon as alloying elements
contributes to decarburization. There is no general numerical limit on decarburization, and
phrases such as "held to a minimum consistent with commercial quality" are very elastic [5] but
it must be careful because it has been shown that decarburization can reduce the fatigue strength
of high-strength steels (1655 MPa and up) by 70% to 80% and lower strength steels (965 to
1034MPa) by 45% to 55%.Surface treatments as a shot peening this problem could be dissolve
or minimized [6, 7].

Sample 2 Sample 3 Sample 6

Figure 6. Example of decarburization on the sample surface, x100

Estimation of the depth of decarburization was done for three samples (Sample 2, 3 and 4) and
results are presented in Table 4.
 Table 4. The results of testing of the decarburization depth
Depth of decarburization, μm
Sample Single values
1 2 3 4 5 Average
Sample 2 59.3 57.9 45.1 54.0 55.4 54.3
Sample 3 69.6 69.7 72.8 75.2 70.5 71.6
Sample 4 - - - - - -

Analysis of results showed that there was not decarburization for the soft annealed sample and
the depth of decarburization was higher for sample who was cooling in the furnace what was
expected.

Analysis of hardness
The results of the hardness analysis are presented in Table 5.

Table 5. Analysis of hardness

Hardness (HV 10)
Sample
Single values Average
Sample 1
176 170 185 186 179 179
(initial state)
Sample 2
665 665 665 665 665 665
850 0C/5’/ air
Sample 3
0 187 186 186 187 187 187
850 C/5’/ furnace
Sample 4
0 187 170 171 173 173 175
650 C/5’/ furnace
Sample 5
824 824 824 824 824 824
850 0C/5’/ water
Sample 6
698 698 681 681 681 688
850 0C/5’/ oil
Sample 7
850 0C/5’/ water 473 498 503 514 514 500
400 0C/5’/ air
Sample 8
850 0C/5’/ oil 483 503 508 514 519 505
400 0C/5’/ air

The analysis of the hardness results showed that the hardness of the initial and soft annealed state
is similar, which is confirmed by the microstructure analysis. Quenching in water or oil may
increase the hardness by about four times with respect to the initial state. The tempering, whether
it be quenching in water or oil, gives a hardness of 500 i.e. 505 HV. Unexpected results were
obtained with the air-cooled normalization process. In this case a very high hardness value (665
HV) was obtained, which almost corresponds to the hardness after oil quenching (688 HV). The
reasons for such a high cooling rate are in the dimensions of the samples (approx. 2x70 mm) as
well as the chemical composition. After normalization and cooling of the samples in the furnace,
the hardness was 3.5x less than after air cooling.
4. CONCLUSIONS
From the results it could be concluded follows:
 The initial state (who was unknown) is the soft annealed state where are spherical carbide
particles are placed in the ferrite matrix.
 By quenching it is possible to increase hardness about four times thanks to martensite or
bainite microstructure.
 After tempering the hardness is almost the same whether it quenching in water or oil.
 Cooling in the air after the normalization gave almost the same hardness as quenching in
oil thanks to bainite microstructure.
 Heat treatment should be done in a protect atmosphere because the steel is sensitive to
decarburization.

5. LITERATURE
[1] https://www.ispatguru.com/spring-steels/ [31.01.2020]
[2] K. H. Prabhudev,Handbook of Heat Treatment of Steels, Tata McGraw-Hill, New Delhi, 1988.
[3] M.Novosel, D. Krumes, Posebni čelici, Sveučilište J.J.Strossmayera u Osijeku, Strojarski fakultet u
SlavonskomBrodu, 1998.
[4] https://www.steel-grades.com/Steel-Grades/Structure-Steel/EN-67SiCr5.html [10.02.2020.]
[5] ASM Handbook,Properties and Selection: Irons, Steels, and High Performance Alloys, Section:
Carbon and Low-Alloy Steels Loren Godfrey, Steel Springs, vol.1. 1990.
[6] F.Begovac, Osobine čelika, Univerzitet u Sarajevu, Fakultet za metalurgiju imaterijale, Zenica,
2000.
[7] https://www.shotpeener.com/library/pdf/2001012.pdf [10.02.2020.]