J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428
DOI 10.1007/s10853-012-6571-3
Barkhausen noise characterisation during elastic bending
and tensile-compression loading of case-hardened and tempered
samples
Suvi Santa-aho • Minnamari Vippola •
Tuomo Saarinen • Matti Isakov • Aki Sorsa •
Mari Lindgren • Kauko Leiviskä • Toivo Lepistö
Received: 28 February 2012 / Accepted: 9 May 2012 / Published online: 24 May 2012
Ó Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012
Abstract This study examined the Barkhausen noise (BN)
response of carburising case-hardened steel with varying
tempering stages. The test material was loaded in bending
and in alternating loading. The aim of the study was to obtain
relevant multiparameter BN data from different loading
conditions and to investigate the effect of applied stress on
the BN response. The test bar series was made from case-
hardened steel. Different tempering parameters were used to
vary the surface hardness and the surface residual stresses of
the studied series of test bars. In the bending tests, the
samples were subjected to incrementally applied loading in
the purely elastic deformation region. In addition, uniaxial
stepwise loading with tensile and compressive stress was
applied to selected samples simultaneously with the BN
measurements. The BN measurements were performed
under different loading conditions along with X-ray dif-
fraction strain measurements in bending. The results
revealed linear behaviour between the reciprocal root mean
square value and the stress values obtained with strain gages
and X-ray diffraction for the tempered samples.
S. Santa-aho (&)  M. Vippola  M. Isakov  T. Lepistö
Department of Materials Science, Tampere University
of Technology, P.O. Box 589, 33101 Tampere, Finland
e-mail: suvi.santa-aho@tut.fi
T. Saarinen
Ruukki Metals Oyj, Rautaruukintie 155, 92101 Raahe, Finland
A. Sorsa  K. Leiviskä
Control Engineering Laboratory, University of Oulu,
P.O. Box 4300, Oulu, Finland
M. Lindgren
Outotec (Finland) Oy, Pori, Finland
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Introduction
The Barkhausen noise (BN) method is a non-destructive
inspection technique for ferromagnetic materials. The use of
the method is based on the observation of irreversible
domain wall motion in ferromagnetic material producing
changes in the magnetisation. The BN signal is known to be
affected by many microstructural features (different phases,
grain boundaries, dislocations, precipitates, etc.) and also by
stress. Microstructural changes can be generated by tem-
pering heat treatment. Usually tempering is done to brittle
as-quenched martensite to improve ductility and to reduce the
residual stresses caused by previous treatments. Normally,
when steel is tempered, changes in grain size and carbide
precipitations are observed first [1]. During the tempering of
high-carbon steels, firstly e-carbide (Fe2C) precipitates grow
by a displacive mechanism because of the excess carbon in
the structure. This can happen at as low as 50 °C [1]. The
e-carbides formed at 100–200 °C are small, the diameter
being only approximately 2 nm [2]. The cementite carbides
(Fe3C) start to form during the temperature range of
200–300 °C [2]. The most likely sites for cementite nucle-
ation are the interfaces between the e-carbides and the matrix
[3]. It should be noted that Fe3C can also directly precipitate
and this is probable in the case of a material with high defect
density. At higher tempering temperatures, the Fe3C coarsen
and grow at the expense of the e-carbides. Several studies
[4, 5] have concentrated on the effect of tempering on BN
responses. For example, Moorthy et al. [4] studied the effect
of tempering on 0.2 % carbon steel. In particular, they
focused on the effect of the dissolution of martensite and
precipitation of Fe3C on BN responses. Extensive micro-
scopic studies of tempering effects with scanning electron
microscope (SEM) and transmission electron microscope can
be found, for example, in [6, 7].
J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428
The tempering procedure also produces changes in the
residual stress state. The compressive residual stresses
decrease and may even change into tensile residual stresses
during tempering. Both a higher tempering temperature and
extended tempering time decrease the residual stresses.
This is because of the dimensional changes in the structure
occurring during martensite decomposition into ferrite and
cementite carbides [8].
The relation between BN and stress is relatively well
understood. For ferromagnetic materials such as steels,
which have a positive magnetostriction coefficient, the BN
signal shows an increasing trend in the direction of the
applied tensile stress and a decreasing trend in the direction
of the applied compression [9]. The stress-induced change
of the BN signal can be understood on the basis of the
changes in the magnetic domain wall configuration and the
mobility of the domain walls.
In some studies, different stress sensitivities of the BN
signal have also been reported [10, 11]. This may be because
of the different steel composition, heat treatment and BN
measuring equipment used. Some studies, for example [12],
report that the stress versus BN behaviour saturates at some
stress level. Usually the behaviour is different in compres-
sive and tensile loading. Also, a decrease in the BN ampli-
tude with applied high tensile stress after the saturation point
can be observed [13, 14]. This complicated phenomenon can
be explained in many ways according to Cullity [15]. After a
certain applied tensile stress, the number of pinning sites
increases because of induced stress anisotropy and, thus, BN
activity is decreased. In addition, tensile stress affects the
magnetostrictive coefficient, changing it to negative and as a
result influences the BN amplitude. Stress also influences the
energy of the domain wall in comparison to the energy of
the pinning sites [16]. In other words, tensile stress helps the
detachment of a domain wall from a pinning site, generating
higher BN signals. Studies concentrating on the effect of
elastic and plastic deformation on the BN signal in mild
steels are presented in [10, 17, 18]. These studies show
different variations in the BN response according to the steel
composition. They also show that the phenomenon itself is
complex and the interpretation of the results is challenging.
When a sample is exposed to external forces, the shape
of the sample may change. This deformation, or strain, is
defined in tensile loading as the change in specimen length
compared with the original length. This means that strain is
the relative deformation produced by the applied forces.
The strain caused by stress can be either elastic or plastic,
both having different mechanisms. Ferritic or martensitic
steels behave elastically when the stress acting on a spec-
imen is smaller than the yield strength. As a consequence,
the deformation state is reversible. The elastic modulus
defines the relation of stress to elastic strain. Some BN
studies concentrate on the sensitivity of BN to the strain.
6421
The study of Stefanita et al. [17] investigated the behaviour
of BN below the material yield strength in uniaxial tension.
They also studied the effect of plastic strain on BN [17].
The BN was observed to have a stronger dependence on
elastic strain and it was observed that plastic deformation
caused only minor changes to BN [17, 19]. These major
changes in BN were explained by the effect of stress on the
atomic lattice spacing. Plastic deformation also affects the
number of pinning sites, crystallographic texture and stress
through work-hardening phenomena [17]. Blaow et al. [20]
noticed an increasing tensile strain increases the BN peak
height and also shifts the peak position to lower magnetic
field strengths.
The reason for BN signal generation is the irreversible
changes in magnetisation that occur because of the applied
magnetic field generated with the BN sensor. In a high hard-
ness martensitic structure, domain wall motion is hindered by
the martensitic structure itself with its high dislocation den-
sity. Compared with the softer ferritic microstructure, the
martensitic structure hinders domain wall motion more
effectively [9]. External stress promotes the detachment of the
domain walls from the pinning sites and thus a greater BN
signal is generated under tensile loading.
Several studies have been carried out to study the effect
of bending on the BN phenomena [11, 12, 20–22]. In one
example of these bending tests, the specimen acts as a
cantilever. In the studies [11, 12, 20–22] made with this
method, the specimens were mounted in such a way that
the BN measurements could be carried out from both sides
of the sample, from the surface under tension and from the
opposite surface under compression. The bending moment
was incrementally applied by increasing the mass on the
free end of the cantilever. The BN measurements were
performed with a low magnetising frequency apparatus
from opposite sides of the sample, thus BN measurement
results from compressive loading were also reported
[11, 12]. However, the best way to perform a bending test
is the four-point bending performed in this study. In four-
point bending, tensile stress is produced in the front sur-
face. The stress is constant between the two inner bending
supports, whereas cantilever bending causes non-uniform
stress in the sample surface.
In general, tensile stress is observed to increase the BN
signal and compressive stress to decrease it. Furthermore, it
has been reported that tensile loading produces only one BN
envelope peak [21, 23]. In contrast, during compressive
loading, several BN envelope peaks may appear [18, 20, 21].
In addition, plastic deformation during bending has been
observed to leave residual compressive stresses on the side
subjected to tensile stress on unloading [21]. Besides the root
mean square (RMS) value, the reciprocal of the BN peak
amplitude was noticed to show linear behaviour with respect
to the applied tensile and compressive stress [24].
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6422 J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428

Usually mild steel specimens have been used when Table 1 Nominal chemical composition of RAEX400 steel
studying the effect of applied loading on the BN phe- C Cr Mn Si Fe
nomenon [10, 17, 19]. However, in some studies, hardened
steel grades have also been used [11, 12, 21, 23]. Often the Wt% 0.14 0.9 1.2 0.2 Bal.
hardened steel grades are more difficult to study because
the microstructure is more complex in nature. The hard
martensite structure also requires a larger applied load for Table 2 Tempering procedure for bending samples
plastic deformation in the material. It is, however, still Procedure Tempering temperature (°C) Tempering time (min)
important to study these materials because they are com-
monly used in components subjected to loading, e.g., gears. Bulk sample – –
We have earlier studied the relationship between BN and 1 180 60
material properties [23, 25–27]. These studies concentrated 2 160 60
on studying hardened component surfaces using BN and 3 200 60
X-ray diffraction method. In [23], the characterisation of 4 225 60
case-hardened steel was investigated, while [25–27] studied 5 275 60
the detection and prediction of surface defects because of 6 300 60
grinding. The material properties measured in all the pre- 7 250 30
vious studies were surface hardness and residual stress. 8 275 30
In this study, stress below yield strength is applied to 9 300 30
case-hardened steel samples to examine the effect of 10 630 15
loading on multiparameter Barkhausen noise measure-
ments. Because, in addition to stress and the effect of
loading, BN is also sensitive to microstructure, samples adjusted to 0.8 %. The specimens were directly quenched in
were tempered to vary the surface hardness and residual air. A hardening temperature of 930 °C was used to ensure a
stress state. The specimens were then subjected to four- fully austenitic starting condition. The surface hardness was
point bending. In the bending apparatus, the upper side of measured to be 880 HV1 after carburising case-hardening.
the specimen is subjected to constant tension in the area The residual austenite content was measured by the X-ray
between the load applicators. BN and X-ray diffraction diffraction technique to be 4 %. The residual stress in the
residual stress measurements were carried out in situ dur- surface after carburising case-hardening was measured by
ing the bending test on the tensile loaded surface. The X-ray diffraction to be from -1,000 to -1,100 MPa in
strain caused by bending was measured with a strain gage parallel and transverse to the loading direction. After case
mounted near the region examined using BN and X-ray hardening, the samples were tempered in a tube furnace with
diffraction. The bending was performed to a certain level, different temperature–time combinations to modify the final
after which the specimen was unloaded. The loading– microstructure and hardness. The tempering temperature
unloading cycle was continued with an increasing load. In varied from 180 to 300 °C and the tempering time was
addition, uniaxial stepwise loading with tensile and com- between 30 and 60 min. The selected tempering tempera-
pressive stress was performed on a representative set of tures and holding times are given in Table 2. One sample was
samples with hydraulic tensile machine. The objective of stress relief annealed at 630 °C for 15 min. Oxidation of the
the study was to gain insight into the relation of the applied samples was prevented by using an inert argon atmosphere in
loading and different hardness values, i.e., different the tube furnace. After tempering, all the samples were
microstructures, to the obtained multiparameter BN. electrolytically polished with LectroPol-5 (Struers) appara-
tus using a voltage of 40 V and a 36-s polishing time. The
electrolyte used for electrolytic polishing was Struers A2, a
Materials and methods solution of 5 % perchloric acid in methanol.

The samples were machined from RAEX400 low-alloy hot-
rolled steel. Table 1 presents the nominal chemical compo-
sition of the studied steel. The bending samples were cut into
rectangular shape with a length of 300 mm, width of 30 mm
and thickness of 6 mm. The samples were carburising case-
hardened in a vacuum chamber at 930 °C for 20 min to a
case-hardening depth (CHD) of 0.8 mm. During the carbu-
rising process, the carbon potential of the furnace was
Barkhausen noise measurements
The multiparameter Barkhausen noise measurements were
carried out with a Rollscan 300 BN measurement device
using MicroScan software (manufactured by Stresstech Oy,
Finland). The Rollscan 300 is a digital signal-processing
instrument with multiple frequency and voltage adjustment.
The actual BN measurements were carried out in situ during

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J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428
the bending and uniaxial loading tests. The magnetising
voltage was 8 Vpp (voltage peak to peak) and the magne-
tising frequency was 125 Hz. The measuring direction was
parallel to the longitudinal direction of the bending samples.
Different analysing frequency ranges, 20–100, 20–500 and
70–200 kHz, were used for BN data processing. However,
no drastic changes were observed between the different
analysing frequency values and thus the frequency of
70–200 kHz was chosen for data processing.
In situ X-ray diffraction stress measurements
during bending
The residual stress and retained austenite measurements
were performed using the X-ray diffraction (XRD) tech-
nique. The residual stress measurements were performed in
unloaded condition in the same measuring direction as the
multiparameter BN measurements. Residual stresses were
measured with a portable Stresstech XStress 3000 X-ray
residual stress diffractometer (manufactured by Stresstech
Oy, Finland). The measurement was performed using the
Chi method [28]. The principle of this measurement is that
the interplanar lattice spacing of the ferrite [211] plane can
be calculated using Bragg’s law from the reflections from
the 156° Bragg diffraction angle. The inclined measure-
ments were made at four different tilt angles. The mea-
surement itself measures strain but the stress can be
indirectly determined from the change in the lattice
parameters determined by the different tilt angles if the
X-ray elastic constants (elastic modulus and Poisson’s
ratio) are known. The measurements with the XStress 3000
stress analyser were conducted with collimator of 3 mm,
operated using 30 kV voltage, 6.7 mA current and CrKa
radiation. CrKa radiation was selected as it gives a mea-
suring depth of 5–6 lm. This is somewhat less than the
information depth of the BN measurements [29].
Strain measurements
The strain measurements during the bending and uniaxial
stepwise loading were performed with strain gages. The
Fig. 1 a The experimental setup for bending (A) indicates the location of the strain gage and (B) the location of the XRD stress and BN
measurements. b The bent sample under the X-ray diffraction equipment
6423
strain gages were mounted on the test specimens using
epoxy in the longitudinal direction of the sample to mea-
sure the strain in the applied stress direction. The one-axial
5-mm long strain gages were manufactured by Kyowa. The
model used was a KFG-5-120-C1-11L1M2R with gage
factors of 2.11 or 2.08. The change in resistance of the
strain gage was measured with a quarter Wheatstone
bridge, which converts the resistance change to the relative
voltage change. This signal was recorded and amplified
with a Kyowa amplifier. The Kyowa amplifier was cali-
brated using the internal calibration operation of the
equipment. The calibration of the setup was verified by
tensile loading a sample using the servo-hydraulic materi-
als testing instrument Instron 8800 (Instron).
Material characterisation
Hardness measurements were performed with the Duramin-
A300 (Struers) hardness-testing machine with a load of
HV1. The elastic modulus E for strain gage calculations
from the carburising hardened samples was confirmed to be
204 GPa. The confirmation was done with tensile tests
performed using the Instron 8800. Microstructural studies
of cross-section samples of the selected deformed samples
were carried out with a Zeiss ULTRAplus field-emission
SEM. The SEM images were taken from the cross-sectional
samples at a depth of 50 lm from the sample surface.
Sample loading: bending
In four-point bending, the sample is subjected to four-point
symmetrical loading. The sample in the bending apparatus is
shown in Fig. 1. This four-point bending system uses two
load applicators, which are evenly spaced from the support.
The bending samples were rectangular 300 mm (L) 9
30 mm (W) 9 6 mm (T). The measurement direction is
shown in Fig. 1a. The load was applied to the specimen in
increments by turning the adjustment screw manually with
a fork spanner. After each load increment, the BN and
surface residual stress measurements were carried out. The
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6424
specimen was unloaded before the next load increment.
The measurements were performed in the purely elastic
deformation range. The strain gage signal was recorded
simultaneously with the bending and the strain was cal-
culated using [30]:
2 Du
e¼ C; ð1Þ
g Cv
where the term C/Cv determines the calibration coefficient
of the strain gage amplifier. C is the calibration output
voltage value and Cv is the calibration voltage. The
measured voltage change because of strain in the strain
gage is Du. In the tests, C was 2,000 9 10-6, Cv was 1 V
and the gage factor g was either 2.11 or 2.08 depending on
the strain gage series used. The stress on the surface
according to the surface strain measured with strain gauges
in bending was calculated with (2). In (2), E is the Young’s
modulus, 204 GPa, for the studied steel.
r ¼ Ee: ð2Þ
Sample loading: uniaxial stepwise tensile
and compression loading
A representative set of bending-tested specimens was
loaded using a servo-hydraulic material testing machine.
The uniaxial stepwise tensile and compression loading
were applied to the specimens to compare the loading
results to the results obtained from the bending tests and
to examine the effect of uniaxial loading on the BN signal.
The loading sequence is shown in Fig. 2. During each
loading step, the load was kept constant while performing
the BN measurements. The BN measurements were car-
ried out at angles parallel to the loading direction and
transverse to the loading direction. The load range varied
from -100 to 250 MPa and was kept less than the yield
point of the steel.
Fig. 2 The loading sequence for uniaxial stepwise tensile and
compression loading with 180 s holding time
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J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428
Results and discussion
Materials characterisation
The measured surface hardness, residual stress, XRD full
width half maximum (FWHM) and BN RMS of the voltage
signal values after the tempering procedures are presented
in Table 3. Figure 3 displays the surface hardness and
residual stress as a function of the tempering temperature.
Figure 3 contains the measurements of samples with tem-
pering times of 30 and 60 min. The hardness values in both
series linearly decreased with an increasing tempering
temperature. The residual stresses behaved linearly as a
function of the tempering temperature for samples with
60-min tempering time. The sample set with a 30-min
tempering time showed non-linear behaviour for 300 °C.
The XRD FWHM values describe the effect of non-
uniform strain on the crystallographic lattice, causing
broadening of the diffraction peak because of point defects
such as dislocations. The martensite structure with high
dislocation density is known to cause XRD peak broad-
ening [31]. This observation was also verified in this study
by measuring the XRD FWHM value. High hardness
samples were measured to have XRD FWHM values of
greater than 5, whereas the bulk sample had values of 2.5.
As is known, both the microstructural state and residual
stresses affect the measured BN RMS value. The effect of
microstructure on the BN phenomenon can be illustrated
by studying the relationship between the surface hardness
and the RMS value. Figure 4 shows that the measured
initial values of surface hardness after tempering but prior
to loading are in a linear relationship to the RMS value
with lower hardness values. Hardness values between 700
and 850 HV1 produced some scattering. In addition, the
highest compressive residual stress values in the range of
-800 to -500 MPa exhibit non-linearity. Similar scatter-
ing in the BN versus residual stress has been reported, e.g.,
in [33]. It has been explained that changes in the micro-
structure can cause variations in the measured BN that are
independent of the stress state [33].
Results of microstructural characterisation
The microstructures of selected mechanically tested sam-
ples were studied using optical and SEM. Tempering
causes the martensite microstructure to change into ferrite
and carbides, and dissolution of carbon also occurs. More
detailed information about the microstructure can be seen
from the SEM images presented in Fig. 5 where (a) is taken
from an untempered martensite and (b) from a sample
tempered at 300 °C for 1 h. A tempering temperature of
300 °C produced a structure of tempered martensite
where the martensite lath structure has already changed
J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428 6425

Table 3 Summary of the initial

Sample Tempering Tempering Surface Residual XRD FWHM in BN RMS
measurements of test samples in
temperature time (min) hardness stress (MPa) loading direction (8 vpp, 125 Hz,
unloaded condition
(°C) (HV1) in loading 70–200 kHz)
direction

Bulk sample – – 300 -144 2.5 124

S1 180 60 851 -757 5.3 53
S2 160 60 834 -755 5.4 46
S3 200 60 777 -661 5.4 58
S4 225 60 701 -599 5.5 51
S5 275 60 624 -366 4.9 153
S6 300 60 600 -275 4.4 131
S7 250 30 751 -761 5.5 59
S8 275 30 765 -638 5.2 59
S9 300 30 659 -650 5.2 86
S10 630 15 358 -27 2.3 176

Bending test results

In the bending tests, loading was incrementally applied in

Fig. 3 Surface hardness and surface residual stress as a function of
the tempering temperature for two different tempering durations, 30
and 60 min
Fig. 4 Surface hardness and residual stress as a function of the RMS
BN value
drastically, when compared with the untempered sample in
Fig. 5a. The carbon in the martensite has dissolved into
areas with carbide precipitates.
the purely elastic deformation region. The stresses were
measured by X-ray diffraction simultaneously with load-
ing. BN measurements were also performed while the
specimen was loaded to obtain information about the BN
versus stress relation. Figure 6 shows the relation of the
measured RMS as a function of the measured stress with
XRD during bending. These general trends are consistent
with previously reported results on the stress versus BN
behaviour of samples with different hardness states
[20, 22]. The steel samples with high hardness showed only
minor loading-imposed changes in the BN RMS values of
voltage amplitude values because of loading. It should be
noted that the RMS values prior to loading were also
observed to scatter in samples having high hardness and
high compressive residual stresses.
In Fig. 6, the BN signal is almost saturated in the region
with the large compressive stress of approximately
-800 MPa. The final increments of bending caused some
yielding in the samples and the plastic deformation that
occurred was noticed from the increased residual com-
pressive stresses after unloading on the tensile loaded side.
However, the amount of plastic deformation was small.
The results reveal the linear behaviour of the reciprocal
RMS value in the measured XRD stress range of -800 to
-200 MPa, as shown in Fig. 8. For the soft bulk sample
and the stress-relieved sample S10, the behaviour was not
linear. The studies of Mierczak et al. [24] reported that the
reciprocal value of the BN peak amplitude exhibited a
linear relationship to the applied stress and also to the
measured surface residual stress values. This phenomenon
was observed by applying different tensile stresses to one

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6426 J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428

Fig. 5 Higher magnification SEM micrographs. a Untempered martensite structure with surface hardness 862 HV1. b Tempered martensite at
300 °C for 1 h with surface hardness 600 HV1 taken at a 50-lm distance from the sample surface

The results of the reciprocal RMS values as a function of

the measured residual stress presented in Fig. 7 suggest
that there is a linear relationship between the reciprocal
RMS and the applied stress measured using XRD and strain
gages. However, it was noticed that the strength of the
relationship depends on the surface hardness. The harder
samples with a surface hardness value of greater than
800 HV1 did not show a meaningful change in the RMS
values when the measured stress decreased from -800 to
-550 MPa. The hardness with increased dislocation den-
sity in the martensite proved a great hindrance to the
moving domain walls. To analyse the influence of hard-
ness, regression lines were identified for the test series.
Examples of these regression lines are given in Fig. 7. As
Fig. 6 RMS values for different sample series as a function of the shown in Fig. 7, the harder sample series produced a
measured XRD stress values in bending steeper regression line. For the harder samples (e.g., S1 and
S2), the slope value was from -4 9 10-5 to -3 9 10-5,
carburised sample. Similar behaviour was also observed whereas for the samples with a hardness of 650–700 HV1,
with variously ground carburised samples with different the slope value was -2 9 10-5. The soft samples had
residual stresses. This phenomenon was explained in terms slope values of -1 9 10-5. The studies of Garikepati et al.
of the fact that the BN peak amplitude versus stress
behaviour corresponds to the relationship between stress
and the slope of the anhysteretic magnetisation curve
reported in [32]. Garikepati et al. [32] suggested that there
is a relationship between the slope of the anhysteretic
magnetisation curve and stress. Their [32] theory also
suggests that the reciprocal value of the anhysteretic sus-
ceptibility behaves linearly with the applied stress and that
the dependence is much stronger under tension. Further-
more, Mierczak et al. [24] proved that the reciprocal value
of the BN peak amplitude behaves similarly to the reci-
procal anhysteretic susceptibility. The trend was similar in
terms of the applied stress and the residual stress [24]. The
assumptions were that both of these features represent the
same stage of the magnetisation process, corresponding to
the steepest slope. Another suggestion was that the rate of
change of the magnetisation was proportional to the BN Fig. 7 Reciprocal RMS values for different sample series as a
activity. function of the measured XRD stress values in bending

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J Mater Sci (2012) 47:6420–6428
[32] and Mierczak et al. [24] did not consider the effect of
hardness on stress sensitivity.
It is stated in the literature [9] that a high dislocation
density has an effect on the domain wall mobility. Dif-
ferent inclusions and precipitates such as carbides also act
as hindering elements to the domain wall. It can be
expected that the size of the carbides is the major param-
eter that has an influence on the observed BN behaviour
[4]. Microstructure observations show that carbides have
formed in the martensite as shown in Fig. 5b. In addition,
the carbides are quite small and numerous in the studied
sample tempered at 300 °C as shown in Fig. 5b. The
changes in the RMS versus stress relationship are thus
explained by the changes in microstructure.
Results of uniaxial stepwise loading
Figure 8 presents the results of the uniaxial stepwise
loading performed simultaneously with BN measurements.
It was impossible to carry out the XRD residual stress
measurements during loading and thus a computational
value termed the real acting stress is introduced. The real
stress value takes into account the residual stress value of
the unloaded sample and is calculated by adding it to the
applied external stress value. Figure 8 shows that a rela-
tionship existed between the BN RMS values and the real
stress. As expected, based on the literature [9], the RMS
value increased with increasing tensile stress. The RMS
value seemed to behave linearly as a function of real stress
when each of the samples was studied individually. How-
ever, the overall relationship shows two distinct regions
where the strength of the RMS versus real stress relation-
ship varies.
Fig. 8 Calculated real stress values as a function of RMS value for
stepwise loading samples
6427
After tempering greater than 275 °C (samples S5 and
S6), a distinct change occurs in the stress versus the mea-
sured BN behaviour. This change in the slope and
increased BN RMS values clearly indicated some signifi-
cant change in the microstructural state because of tem-
pering. Possible carbide formation in the material could be
one explanation. Tempering reduces the dislocation density
and also decreases the required field needed to overcome
the obstacles. Similar behaviour was observed in our earlier
studies [23]. In that study [23], different tempering pro-
cedures carried out on hardened samples. The samples
were uniaxially loaded while simultaneously performing
BN measurements. These samples revealed a similar rela-
tionship between the RMS value and the real stress. It was
also noticed in [23] that the tempered samples with surface
hardness decreased to 600 HV1, which produced a larger
stress response similar to the one observed here.
Results of bending and tensile tests
Generally, the results obtained were consistent with the lit-
erature although there was some scatter in the RMS versus
residual stress and hardness values prior loading. Higher
compressive stresses produced a lower BN signal response
and tensile stresses produced a higher BN signal response
regardless of the loading method applied. Both bending and
uniaxial stepwise loading showed a similar relationship
between BN and stress. This was expected, in accordance
with the studies of Mierczak et al. [24]. The use of strain
gages verified the applied stresses in both loading methods.
It was shown that the reciprocal RMS values changed line-
arly with stress in bending for hardened and tempered
samples. Earlier results [24, 32] had already verified that the
reciprocal anhysteretic susceptibility and BN peak ampli-
tude exhibited this linear relationship to stress. However, it
was noticed in this study that the strength of this relationship
depended on the surface hardness of the tempered samples.
Thus, this study provided a calibration curve for determining
the stress level with different hardness states. As seen in
Fig. 4, the high compressive residual stresses and hardness
may cause scattering and thus larger errors may occur. This
information may be useful, for example, in the making of
calibration samples [26]. Such a task is faced, for example,
when producing an accurate estimation of the stress state
from the BN measurement, especially in the compressive
residual stress region.
For uniaxial stepwise loading, the behaviour was gen-
erally the same. However, it was noticed that tempering
temperatures greater than 275 °C led to drastic micro-
structural changes, which in turn caused significantly
increased RMS values. These microstructural changes may
be because of carbide precipitation. Similar results have
also been obtained in our earlier studies [23].
123
6428
Conclusions
This study investigated the BN response of carburising
case-hardened steel during bending and in uniaxial step-
wise loading. Different tempering parameters were used for
the carburised test bar series to vary the surface hardness
and the residual stresses of the samples. In the bending
tests, the samples were subjected to incrementally applied
loading in the purely elastic deformation region. In addi-
tion, uniaxial stepwise loading with tensile and compres-
sive stress was performed on a representative set of
samples with simultaneous BN measurements.
In bending, the results revealed the linear behaviour of
the reciprocal RMS value as a function of the calculated
stress values obtained with both strain gages and by X-ray
diffraction. The results also showed that the relationship
between the reciprocal RMS value and stress depended on
hardness. For the harder samples, the calculated slope of
the relation was steeper than for the softer tempered sam-
ples. This clearly indicates that stress changes in hard
materials have a smaller effect on the RMS values than in
soft materials.
For the uniaxially loaded samples, there was a rela-
tionship between the BN RMS values and the calculated
real stress values, determined from the residual stress and
the applied stress acting on the sample. Furthermore, the
results of the RMS values of the loaded samples versus real
stress, i.e., the sum of the residual stress and the stress
caused by the applied load, showed two distinct regions for
the RMS versus real stress relationship. It was noticed that
a tempering temperature of greater than 275 °C led to
drastic microstructural changes, which in turn led to
notably increased RMS values.
These observed relationships can be used as base data
for BN measurement calibrations. A calibration curve,
taking into account the dependence of stress and hardness
on BN measurements, can be produced to determine the
actual stress states in specially made calibration samples
for the BN method.
Acknowledgements The support of TEKES for the NOVEBARK
research project is gratefully acknowledged. The authors would also
like to thank the personnel of Stresstech group, Moventas Wind,
Takoma Gears and Katsa Oy for their technical support during the
research.
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