Effect of retained austenite on the dynamic tensile behavior of a novel quenching-partitioning-tempering martensitic steel

The dynamic tensile test with a strain rate of 500 s⁻¹ and the quasi-static tensile test with a strain rate of 5.6×10⁻⁴ s⁻¹ were performed for a novel Fe-0.20C-1.49Mn-1.52Si-0.58Cr-0.05 Nb (wt%) quenching-partitioning-tempering (Q-P-T) martensitic steel with high amount of retained austenite, respectively. This low carbon steel was also treated by the traditional quenching and tempering (Q&T) process, and the same experimental tests were performed for the low carbon Q&T martensitic steel with little retained austenite to understand the effect of the retained austenite on the dynamic tensile behavior. The results indicate that compared with the quasi-static tensile test, the high strain rate in the dynamic tensile test raises the strength of the Q-P-T steel. However, the elongation slightly decreases. These results differ from the enhancement in both the strength and elongation of the Q&T steel in the dynamic tensile test. The increase in the strength of the Q-P-T steel in the dynamic tensile test is attributed to the strain rate hardening effect. The slight decrease in the elongation stems mainly from that the suppression of the dislocation absorption of the retained austenite (DARA) effect existing in the quasi-static tensile test, moreover, such a suppression is not effectively complemented by the adiabatic softening of the martensitic matrix in dynamic tensile test. The marked increase in the elongation of the Q&T steel in the dynamic tensile test is only attributed to the adiabatic softening of the martensite matrix because there is no DARA effect in the Q&T steel with little retrained austenite.