Study on the Effect of Corrosion Behaviour of Stainless Steel before and after Carburizing Heat Treatment

• Main Authors: Ahmad, N.N (Author), Ahmad, S. (Author), Alias, S.K (Author), Fauzi, M.H.M (Author), Sulaiman, S.A (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Institute of Physics Publishing 2016
• Subjects: 304 stainless steel; Carbon; carburizing; Carburizing; Carburizing layers; Carburizing process; Chemical compositions; Corrosion; Corrosion behavior; Corrosion behaviour; Corrosion rate; Corrosion resistance; Corrosive effects; density; Density (specific gravity); Engineering research; hardness; Hardness; Heat treatment; Specification requirement; stainless steel; Stainless steel; Steel testing; Weight loss tests; X ray diffraction
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher; View in Scopus

 This study investigates the effect of corrosion behaviour of stainless steel before and after carburizing process. All samples were prepared based on the testing specification requirement and the chemical compositions of the stainless steel were obtained using spectrometer tester. Samples were then undergoing pack carburizing process by adding 50g of carbon powder as the carburizing agent. Then the samples were heated at 900 °C and 950 °C for 8 hours. To obtain corrosion rate, weight loss test was conducted and the samples were immersed in three different solutions which were distilled water, hydrochloric acid and sodium chloride. Hardness and density test were employed to measure the physical properties of the ASTM 304 stainless steel. The microstructures of all samples were observed using Olympus BX41M optical microscope. The resulting phases after each heat treatment were tested by x-ray diffraction (XRD) tester. The percentage of corrosion values, determined from this technique, showed fairly good agreement. Carburizing process produced a carburizing layer improved mechanical properties and corrosion resistance abilities. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.