Estimation of the hardness for laser surface hardening of plain carbon steel

Laser surface hardening of plain carbon steel is simulated and software in Mathematica has been developed. The software estimates the hardness of plain carbon steel under different carbon contents and processing speeds. The flow chart explains the algorithm of the software. Our results show that hardness increases with carbon contents. The hardness increases slightly with processing speed but at the cost of decrease in hardened depth. The results for test material coincide with the experimental values from independent research results. (author)