Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458

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Materials & Design

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matdes

Design of a novel austenitising bending process in forming

characteristics of high-strength quenched and micro-alloyed steel:
Experiment and simulation
Yao Lu a, Haibo Xie a, Jun Wang a, Fanghui Jia a, Zhou Li a,b, Hamidreza Kamali a, Jianzhong Xu c, Jingtao Han d,
Zhengyi Jiang a,⇑
a
School of Mechanical, Materials, Mechatronics and Biomedical Engineering, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia
b
College of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410083, PR China
c
Key Laboratory of Rolling and Automation, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110004, PR China
d
School of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing 100083, PR China

h i g h l i g h t s g r a p h i c a l a b s t r a c t

A novel designed austenitising

bending process was realised on a
thermomechanical simulator.

Integrated effects of SNL, martensite
packet, PA grain, DRV and DRX were
responsible for the strength gradient.

Parent grain reconstruction and
martensite variants can be achieved a
more effective technique.

The high consistency between
simulation and experiments means
valuable reference of the current
study to simulate rail clip forming
process.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A systematic study was carried out on a novel designed austenitising bending process to explore the
Received 11 November 2021 effects of quenching temperatures on the evolution of microstructure and mechanical properties of
Revised 6 February 2022 high-strength micro-alloyed steel. Results reveal that the qualified parts could be bent into a satisfactory
Accepted 9 February 2022
shape without spring-back and cracks in bending temperatures of 850–1000 °C. The simulation was
Available online 14 February 2022
applied to predict the equivalent stress, stress neutral layer (SNL) and plate thickness. Strength presents
a decreasing trend with the increase of bending temperature owing to integrated influences of high-
Keywords:
temperature dynamic recovery (DRV) and dynamic recrystallisation (DRX). Beyond that, SNL nearby
High-strength and micro-alloyed steel
Austenitising bending
the geometrical centre line throughout the plate thickness and dislocation pile-ups on the tension/com-
Microstructure pression zones are responsible for the smaller hardness on middle regions while higher hardness on the
Mechanical properties surface areas. Through austenite reconstruction, a smaller martensite packet size would directly improve
Simulation the strength of the plates bent at a lower temperature. The prior austenite size may be related to the
Austenite reconstruction appearance of martensite variants but not necessary. Furthermore, the high accuracy by comparing the

Abbreviations: SNL, stress neutral layer; BF, bainitic ferrite; FCC, face-centred cubic; K-S, Kurdjumov-Sachs; FE, finite element; AF, acicular ferrite; BC, band contrast;
MAGB, middle angle grain boundaries; SFE, high stacking faulty energy; DRV, dynamic recovery; RA, retained austenite; BCC, body-centred cubic; IPF, inverse pole figure;
DRX, dynamic recrystallisation; PA, prior austenite; LM, lath martensite; GB, grain boundary; EBSD, electron backscattered diffraction; TEM, transmission electron
microscopy; LAGB, low angle grain boundaries; KAM, kernel average misorientation; GND, geometrically necessary dislocations.
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: jiang@uow.edu.au (Z. Jiang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matdes.2022.110458
0264-1275/Ó 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
experimental results with simulation would provide a high-value reference for the practical manufactur-
ing process of railway spring clips.
Ó 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
1. Introduction
The high-speed railway has experienced remarkable develop-
ment and accounted for an extensive fraction of public transport
worldwide. Although the in-service speed of the railway can rise
to 350 km/h, the higher-speed and superior-quality railway system
is still one goal that public manager pursues. The technology-based
challenges would be presented in many aspects in particular with
the railway fastening system, which was applied to release the
dynamic and static loads onto the railway infrastructure [1]. The
elastic rail clip as a key component of railway fasteners is used
to keep the rail steels and rail sleepers in stable positions [2]. In
practical operation, the failure of railway clips exists due to a cyclic
load resulting from irregular rail and impacts of the wheels [3–5].
This issue compromises the functionality of railway infrastructures
in consideration of railway safety.
0.55 %C Si-Cr micro-alloyed steel as one novel material has been
diffusely concerned in railway infrastructures due to its superior
mechanical properties [2,6]. It is growing in popularity due to the
perfect combination of well-pleasing strength (2.5 GPa), excel-
lent toughness (130 MPa m1/2), and satisfactory elongation
(30%) [7,8]. The dual-phase structure composed of bainitic ferrite
(BF) and retained austenite (RA) is considered as the reason for
superior performance [9]. Besides, owing to the high concentration
of Si element, the carbide precipitation would be greatly prohibited
caused by a low Si solubility in cementite during the bainite phase
transformation progress. At a lower processing temperature, this
kind of steel is difficult to be manufactured since the bainite trans-
formation will be largely suppressed [10,11]. However, the bainitic
transformation could be accelerated due to enough nucleation sites
that are formed after the grain refinement of the prior austenite
(PA) [12,13]. In the practical production of the rail clip, exploring
the influence of the hot forming process on the refinement of BF
and PA through managing the isothermal transformation is an
essential integrant in terms of improving the final performance
of products [14,15]. Therefore, a satisfactory hot forming design
should be established to reflect the relationship between hot-
working conditions and microstructure [16–18], because the char-
acteristics of materials after a hot-working process are relevant to
the final microstructures [19,20]. The austenite grain (FCC (face-
centred cubic) structure) in steels is immediately quenched to
room temperature, and a new phase with body-centred tetragonal
or body-centred cubic (BCC) is formed during phase transition pro-
gress, which is named martensite or martensitic transition [21].
The evolution of martensite is closely related to mechanical prop-
erties in steel. The crystallographic relationships are sustained
after the phase transformation from austenite to martensite, which
results in a characteristic lenticular and lath morphology. Three
typical morphologies, i.e., packet, block and lath could be observed
in steel [21]. The significant influence of lath martensite (LM)
structure on the strength and toughness of metal materials, i.e.,
low-carbon steels [21] and Fe-C alloys [22] due to the different
block and packet sizes that have already been reported. However,
as one typical steel that is manufactured accompanied by water
quenching, nearly no research regarding martensitic morphology
and crystallography of 0.55 %C Si-Cr micro-alloyed steel has been
conducted before. It is of great importance to investigate the
2
Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
evolution of crystallographic and morphological characteristics of
martensite in this experimental steel.
Furthermore, although significant attention has been concen-
trated on the manufacturing process, microstructure evolution,
and product performance of Si-Cr micro-alloyed steel, it is crucial
from an application point of view that there is a dearth of studies
on the effects of elastic rail clip forming technique on its final prop-
erty. This is because the bending experiments at room tempera-
tures are able to be easily carried out. For example, room-
temperature bending investigations on high-strength steel [23],
DP 590/780 steel [24,25], pipeline steel [26], and dual-phase steel
[27,28] have been developed rapidly, aiming to increase the forma-
bility of the materials. As a matter of fact, the high-temperature
processing would create more remarkable advantages, for instance,
increasing formability, decreasing forming force and springback
[29]. Nevertheless, few studies on the high-temperature bending
process have been concerned before, especially when the bending
temperature was chosen to be over a complete austenitising state.
Accordingly, this may suggest that a newly designed hot forming
technology is of great importance to investigate the material char-
acteristics of Si-Cr micro-alloyed steel (typical hot-formed steel
[30–32]) from the point of industrial production.
To forward this objective, the austenitising bending was carried
out by a thermomechanical simulator. The combination of physical
experiments with finite element (FE) simulation is conducive to
obtaining more reliable results. Since the temperature field has a
great influence on production efficiency and cost control, this
paper will systematically discuss the potentialities of various heat-
ing strategies on the bent plates concerning mechanical and
microstructural evolution. The parent grain reconstruction was
applied for the first time to investigate the correlation between
the microstructures after quenching and high-temperature
microstructures. The obtained results will be of great reference
value to the practical production of the steel fasteners because this
study well simulates the actual manufacturing process.
2. Experiment and simulation
2.1. Experimental process parameters
A hot-forged 0.55 %C Si-Cr micro-alloyed steel rod was
employed in this study. The nominal composition in wt.% of the
experimental steel is: 0.55C-1.4Si-0.65Mn-0.65Cr-0.11Ni-0.12Cu-
0.012S-0.018P-Balanced Fe. To better investigate the forming char-
acteristics of the experimental steel at high temperatures, a novel
setup of hot bending experiments, including the custom-built
clamps, sample holder, and punch was carried out on a thermo-
mechanical test simulator (Gleeble 3500) in a vacuum environ-
ment, as shown in Fig. 1(a). The testing samples were extracted
from the hot-forged rods along the transverse direction with the
dimension of 60  10  2 mm (length  width  height). Fig. 1
(b) introduces a test sample that was assembled with Gleeble
3500. The bending temperature was monitored by k-type thermo-
couples spot-welded on the centre of the specimens.
Besides, graphite and tantalum foils were adhered together and
spot-welded to the contact area between the die (punch and
holder) and sample for lubrication to minimise the influence of
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
Fig. 1. (a) Diagrammatic drawing of the hot bending die, (b) Gleeble 3500 assembled with a test specimen, and (c) state of the specimens before and after hot bending.
bonding and friction during the bending process. The phase trans-
formation diagram (see Fig. 2) obtained by thermal-calc software
shows the temperature for complete austenitising is around
800 °C, according to our previous work [32]. To ensure complete
austenitising, the bending temperatures were chosen to be 850,
900, 950 and 1000 °C, respectively. The specimens were heated
to the testing temperatures at the speed of 10 °C/s, then kept for
90 s until the temperature distribution was homogenised. Where-
after, specimens were bent until the loading distance reached
15 mm, with a constant punch speed of 10 mm/min and a defor-
mation duration of 90 s. Subsequently, water quenching was
applied to retain the high-temperature microstructures.
2.2. Materials characterisation
Samples for microstructural examination were extracted from
the central area of bent specimens under different bending tem-
peratures. After being hot-mounted, ground and polished accord-
ing to the standard metallographic methodology for Si-Cr steel,
these were etched by 4 vol% nital solution. The macro morphology
and microstructure were then observed by a VK-X100K 3D Laser
Scanning Microscopy and a Leica Optical Microscopy, respectively.
Fig. 2. Phase diagram of the experimental steel calculated by the thermal-calc software.
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Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
To reveal the effects of bending conditions on the microstructure
evolution, electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD) experiments
were carried out on a JEOL JSM-7001F field emission gun scanning
electron microscopy with a scanning area of 110  80 lm and a
step size of 0.1 lm. All the obtained EBSD data was post-
processed by HKL Channel 5 software. The JEOL JEM-2010 trans-
mission electron microscopy (TEM) was used to further observe
the microstructure evolution at high magnification. Foils for TEM
observation were firstly ground to 50 lm thick and then twin-jet
electrolytic polished with an electrolyte composed of 50 vol.%
perchloric + 50 vol% ethyl alcohol at 10 V and  30 °C. The austen-
ite reconstruction was carried out by the MTEX toolbox in Matlab
software [33].
2.3. Finite element (FE) modelling
The ABAQUS software was utilised for the FE modelling. Rele-
vant mechanical properties of the experimental steel were col-
lected from our previous studies [30,32]. To well simulate the
entire process, all the simulated parameters strictly follow the
actual experiments. The simplified assembly model was displayed
in Fig. 1(a), as well. In this model, clamp and holder were defined
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
as rigid bodies. The bending temperatures were classified by four
separate parameters (850, 900, 950 and 1000 °C) and the friction
coefficients were chosen to be 0.1 between all the contact areas.
Primarily, no constraint was set for blank, while the holder and
clamp were constrained in all directions. Besides, the punch was
established with one freedom along the bending direction. Further-
more, the model of blank and all the other rigid bodies meshed
with the element size of 0.5 and 1.5, respectively.
3. Results
3.1. Morphology and final microstructure
Morphology observation (see Fig. 3(a)(b)(e) and (f)) displays
that the tested plates can be well bent without visible cracks at
all bending temperatures even in the regions with maximum
Fig. 3. The morphology of the plates bent at (a) 850 °C, (b) 900 °C, (e) 950 °C, and (f) 1000 °C; corresponding microstructures in the middle bent regions shown in (c), (d), (g)
and (h), respectively.
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Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
degree. The difference in the bending angles u1, u2, u3, and u4
was negligible, validating the advantage of reducing spring-back
during the austenitising bending operation given above. On the
other hand, the bending angle is hard to be affected by forming
temperature due to the parallel layer stacking sequence [34]. By
magnifying the central areas throughout the plate thickness, the
final microstructures were compared as shown in Fig. 3(c)(d)(g)
and (h). The microstructures at different temperatures were
mainly composed of BF, LM, and acicular ferrite (AF). Notably,
the AF was decreased with the increase of temperature. This is
because the acceleration of deformed substructures such as dislo-
cation, in consequence, benefits AF nucleation at lower deforma-
tion temperatures. In a further increased temperature, the
substructures induced by working hardening will be consumed
by DRX [32], leading to the major observation of BF and LM at
the bending temperatures of 950 and 1000 °C (see Fig. 3(g) and
(h)).
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
By magnifying the central areas throughout the plate thickness,
the final microstructures were compared as shown in Fig. 3(c)(d)
(g) and (h). The microstructures at different temperatures Further-
more, the band structure was apparently displayed in Fig. 3(c)(d)
(g) and (h). In the process of mechanical deformation, the
microsegregation of dendrites extends in bunches parallel to the
dominant flow direction, which is responsible for the formation
of microstructural bands in low alloy steels (the terms of clarifica-
tion proposed by Renata. et al [35], John [36] and Ted. et al [37] are
adopted here).
3.2. Micro-hardness transition
To obtain the micro-hardness transition of the plates bent at
different temperatures, Fig. 4(a) displays the hardness measure-
ment scheme of five testing columns in the bent regions. Through
the colour legend shown in Fig. 4(a), it is intuitively observed that
hardness decreases with increasing temperatures, while the colour
distribution in the hardness maps appears to be asymmetrical for
each plate due to the development of microstructure and disloca-
tion accumulation [31]. Moreover, since the hardness gradient pre-
sented subtle deviation (less than 2%) of each bent plate, it may be
speculated that the microstructural variations throughout the
thickness were not significant (see Fig. 4(b)). Nevertheless, the
minimum hardness can be obtained on the positions of central
areas and surfaces. This may suggest that oxidation and decar-
burised layer were enhanced due to the incoming air during the
water quenching process, resulting in the smaller hardness on
the surfaces. Besides, the smaller hardness observed on the middle
areas will be discussed in detail when combing it with simulation
results in the following sections. Fig. 4(c) shows that the plate bent
at 850 °C exhibited the biggest hardness value (850 HV) in compar-
ison to those counterparts deformed at higher temperatures. This
is because the decreasing hardness indicates the dominant
Fig. 4. (a) The hardness cartography mapping of specimens bent at different temperatures; (b) transition of hardness value along the bending axis; and (c) comparison of
mean hardness values under different bending temperatures.
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Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
dynamic softening caused by a more server DRX phenomenon
under a higher-temperature bending process [16].
3.3. FE modelling
To validate the proposed procedure, it is necessary to explore
the macroscopic properties of the bent samples at various hot
working conditions. As an important consideration factor, the load-
ing force would be chosen to be a reference in industrial produc-
tion [34]. Fig. 5(a) exhibits the simulation work that the plate
was bent at a complete bending status.
The influences of bending temperatures on the loading force vs
bending time obtained from experiments were compared to those
predicted by simulation (see Fig. 5(b)), indicating high accurate FE
modelling due to the good agreement between simulation and
experiments. Besides, an overall decreasing trend of force value
can be observed with the increase of forming temperature, which
was ascribed to the fact that the impact of DRX became more sig-
nificant at higher-temperature forming processes [30,32]. It is
worth noting here that the peak force of each forming temperature
normally occurred between 40 and 50 s of the bending time owing
to the neutralisation of dynamic softening and work hardening.
Whereafter, since the dynamic softening was enhanced as a result
of the dislocation annihilation and rearrangement [30], there
occurred a decreasing forming force in the later stages of
deformation.
Corresponding equivalent stress contours outputted by the
modelling are shown in Fig. 5(c). Note that the maximum equiva-
lent stress shows a decrease (from 149.1 MPa to 85.8 MPa) with a
temperature rise in the range of 850–1000 °C. Besides, there was
nearly the same stress concentration region at a certain bending
degree of each plate in the bent areas. Report [23] suggested that
residual elastic compression/tension is applied to the inner/outer
surface of the plastic deformation, aiming at balancing elastic
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
Fig. 5. (a) Schematic showing the bent plate assembled by the custom-built die in the simulation; (b) the comparison of experimental forming force with simulated results
under different hot bending operations; and (c) corresponding equivalent stress distribution of each bent plate.
stresses of the entire cross-section. Thus in the stress concentration
regions, the stress magnitude was much bigger at the surfaces and
a decreased tendency could be obtained towards the central line
throughout the plate thickness.
3.4. Crystallographic feature
Although the austenitic substructure during deformation in the
experimental steel should be not so obvious as that of austenitic
modal steel due to phase transformation [38], the crystallographic
features would be significantly influenced by various metallurgical
events during forming progress. Generally, no matter what the
condition of austenite is, the orientation domains are evenly dis-
tributed. This is because all generated phases are considered to
be followed by the theoretical Kurdjumov-Sachs (K-S) rules [39].
Here, EBSD mapping figures focused on the bent area of each
forming temperature are displayed in Fig. 6. It is evident that the
ferrite structure grows up with the increase of bending tempera-
ture and is normally laid on the grain boundaries of PA (see
Fig. 6(a)(d)(g) and (j)), which may suggest the close relationship
between the final microstructure and PA grain size. Furthermore,
the grain distribution did not present any correlation with bending
temperature and direction from inverse pole figure (IPF) maps (see
Fig. 6(b)(e)(h) and (k)). This phenomenon can be also authenticated
right now by the grain boundary (GB) mapping results as illus-
trated in Fig. 6(c)(f)(i) and (l), where the stochastic misorientation
angles in the range of 20-45° were described by blue lines and the
misorientation boundaries over 45° were traced by green lines
[32]. Since PA was thought to be equipped with random misorien-
tation boundary [16], the blue lines largely indicate the distribu-
tion of DRX grains. The large area without green lines is evidence
of a non-recrystallised and deformed austenite matrix. Thus, only
part of the DRX in all bending conditions was obtained.
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Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
By comparing the misorientation angle distribution of samples
bent at different temperatures a similar trend could be clearly
observed from Fig. 7(a). Here, to suit the transformed strain, the
transformation dislocation would be generated in the austenitic
matrix, leading to a larger proportion of low angle (2-5°) grain
boundaries (LAGB, see Fig. 7(b)). The lower the bending tempera-
ture is, the larger the dislocation density would be [39,40]. There-
fore, it can be speculated that the average hardness shows higher
values at lower temperatures due to the dislocations accumulation.
Moreover, a higher frequency of middle angle (20-45°) grain
boundaries (MAGB) was found in the specimen bent at 850 °C as
compared to the plates bent at other temperatures, as displayed
in Fig. 7(c) with high magnification. The MAGB are mostly inher-
ited from the previously deformed austenite since it is the default
value for coherent transformation in this range [39]. In addition,
the higher frequency of MAGB clarifies that PA bent at a lower tem-
perature would experience bulging, and new substructures were
formed due to a large deformation degree [32].
3.5. Kernel average misorientation (KAM) maps
Within an individual grain, the short-range orientation gradi-
ents can be described evocatively by a Kernel average misorienta-
tion (KAM) map derived from the EBSD data. KAM analysis is
normally applied to indicate the strain distribution in different
materials as a measurement of local grain misorientation [16],
which was detected by specific misorientation boundaries (less
than5°) by a 7x7-pixel filter in this study (see Fig. 8(a)). Although
it is hard to tell them apart from the colour legend so clearly, it
is still apparent that the brighter regions could be observed under
all forming conditions. The areas with bright colours correspond to
the higher local grain misorientation than others due to the no-
recrystallised austenite that existed here before phase transforma-
tion. This may further verify partial DRX in this case as mentioned
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
Fig. 6. Band contrast (BC), Inverse pole figure (IPF) and grain boundary (GB) maps of plates bent at: (a-c) 850 °C, (d-f) 900 °C, (g-i) 950 °C, and (j-l) 1000 °C; Note, the
crystallographic orientation-colour relation map corresponding to the colour-coded stereographic triangle IPF.
above, and a detailed comparison will be given in the Discussion
section.
Fig. 8(b) displays the high-resolution graphs of the red circled
areas obtained from Fig. 8(a), indicating that the substructures
occurred along the grain boundaries [16]. The outputted local
misorientation profile (see Fig. 8(c)) along with the dashed arrows
validates there exist substructures when the highest local misori-
entation angle is close to 5°. It is worth mentioning that although
substructures could be detected in each case, there were appar-
ently more new substructures that were created on the plate under
the deformation temperature of 850 °C, which was consistent with
the above results of misorientation angle distribution.
3.6. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observation
Based on the reference provided by EBSD detection, the DRV
was main obtained at a relatively lower bending temperature:
850 °C. To intuitively clarify any possible subgrains in this case,
the TEM technique was applied, as well. In general, the work soft-
ening process is influenced by comprehensive factors of DRX and
high-temperature DRV in the hot deformation process [41]. High-
7
Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
temperature DRV was considered to be the main reason for the
development of subgrains in metal materials due to high stacking
faulty energy (SFE), which is normally characterised by climbing
and cross slip of moving dislocation [30]. The arrows presented
in Fig. 9(a) indicate polygonized sub-boundary, which was also
been proposed by Zhang et al. [41] that polygonization was pro-
moted and thought to be the typical feature of the high-
temperature DRV. Besides, the dominant morphologies of various
dislocation configurations can be classified into subgrain bound-
ary, intercrystalline dislocation cells and dislocation pile-up, as
shown in Fig. 9(b). Furthermore, a few thin-film retained austenite
would be located at the martensite boundaries, which is accompa-
nied by high-density dislocation at the lathes of martensite (see
Fig. 9(c)). Fig. 9(d) illustrates a specific observation of inner twin
martensite with tinny substructures, indicating the twin structure
could be formed in the experimental steel with the condition of
high SFE. Although it is well known that twin structure normally
exists in metal materials with low SFE [42], this new finding in this
hot bending process calrifies the excellent forming performance
due to the favorable influence of twin structure on strength and
ductility.
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al. Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458

Fig. 7. Misorientation angle distribution of the plates at different hot operations: (a) overall distribution of each bent plate, (b) low misorientation angle distribution, and (c)
middle misorientation angle distribution.

Fig. 8. (a) KAM maps for the specimens bent at temperatures of 850 °C, 900 °C, 950 °C, and 1000 °C, respectively; (b) high-resolution graph of each red circled region; and (c)
corresponding local misorientation angles profile of each dashed line. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web
version of this article.)

8
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al. Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458

Fig. 9. TEM graphs of the plate bent at the temperature of 850 °C: (a) polygonized sub-boundary, (b) dislocation cells and pile-up with a grain boundary, (c) retained austenite
and grain boundary, and (d) twin microstructure.

3.7. Martensite variants Furthermore, the distribution of martensite variants under the
bending temperature of 850 °C is presented in Fig. 10(d), which
Normally, since LM is generated in steels with a carbon content was determined in combination with Fig. 10(e). The obtained
of less than 0.6 wt% [21], this experimental steel was expected to result from Channel 5 directly revealed that nearly all variants
0
obtain a K-S relationship between martensite ða Þ and austenite appear in this PA grain except for V14. Actually, the absence of
(c), which can be described as ð111Þc// ð011Þa ;
0 V14 was normally thought to be a naturally absent variant due
h i h  i to the lack of transformation space [45]. It is well known that the
1 01 c// 1 1 1 a . Given this the relationship exists, the cubic
0

neighbour martensite normally exhibits the variants with specific

structure is equipped with 24 variants (indicated as V1-V24), combinations to accommodate the transformation of strain [46].
which are all transformed from single austenite [21,22,43,44]. The spread of variant orientation was paired between V1 and V4,
Fig. 10(a) exhibits the orientation relationship between 6 K-S vari- which identified the combination of variants that occurred in this
ants (V1 - V6) in a given packet and their c matrix. It has been pro- PA. Meanwhile, a huge amount of paired variants in this region
posed by Morito et al. [22] that the V1 and V2 show a twin can be identified, indicating the martensite variants normally
orientation relationship when V1 is used as the base variant. The occur as a group [44], including V1 paired V4, V2 paired V5, V3
V1 and V3 show a relationship of [0 1 1]/60°, and the same orienta- paired V6, V7 paired V10, V9 paired V12, V8 paired V11, V19 paired
tion can be observed between V1 and V5. Besides, V1 and V6 exhi- V22, V20 paired V23 and V21 paired V24. These particular pairs are
bit an orientation of [0 1 1]/49.5°. Moreover, a smaller angle can be called sub-block, which presents a minimum misorientation angle
obtained between V1 and V4, which is about 10°. Since austenite (10.53°) between each variant as mentioned in the content above.
has four different ð111Þc orientations, 24 variants in total can be There was only one single V17 that was found in some regions
obtained during the phase transformation progress. Fig. 10(b) without its paired variant V14.
describes 24 variants of martensite at the condition of (0 0 1)
[1 0 0] of austenite orientation, which has been reported by Kita-
4. Discussion
hara et al. [21]. In fact, the 24 variants can be taken as a reference
by comparing the experimental martensite orientation relation-
Since the detected hardness value displayed an apparent gradi-
ship with the plots shown in Fig. 10(b). The detailed calculation
ent under different bending temperatures, the following sections
methods for martensite variants through martensite transition
will comprehensively discuss the strength mechanism in aspects
have been introduced by both Kitahara et al. [21] and Morito
of macroscopic properties, final microstructures and high-
et al. [22]. In the current work, the morphology of the hierarchical
temperature microstructures, respectively.
martensite was provided in detail, as well. Fig. 10(c) clarifies the
schematic of LM with three kinds of hierarchy, which can be clas-
4.1. Role of stress neutral layer (SNL) in the bending process
sified into the packet, block and lath martensite in its morphology.
Thereinto, lath is the basic unit of martensite. Each block is com-
The stress neutral layer (SNL), known as the neutral surface is
posed of laths, which are formed by low angle misorientation
defined as the critical layer connecting compressive and tensile
(greater than10°). Normally, a packet can be divided into several
zones at a certain bent dimension so that the surface at the extra-
blocks. A maximum number of 6 various blocks (variants) may
dos is thought to be the tension zone, whereas that on the inner
occur in an identical packet. The minimum angle of misorientation
sides is called compression zone [47]. Fig. 11 shows the predicted
between block and packet boundaries is 10.53° [21].
results regarding the S22 distribution, the location of SNL, and the
9
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al. Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458

Fig. 10. (a) Six orientations of K-S variants (V1-V6) in a packet evolving from a ð111Þc plane; (b) f001g standard crystallographic orientations of martensite variant of V1
based on a (0 0 1)[1 0 0] austenite orientation of 23 other variants are represented as solid marks; (c) Illustration exhibiting the hierarchical lath martensite; (d) the
distribution of martensite variants in prior austenite (PA), and (e) pole figure of martensite in this PA.

Fig. 11. Transverse stress (S22) distribution at different bending temperatures in regard to the position of stress neutral layer (SNL), and thickness evolution of the bent
specimens at the temperatures of (a) 850 °C, (b) 900 °C, (c) 950 °C, and (d) 1000 °C, respectively.

bent plate thickness at temperatures of 850–1000 °C, respectively.
In this study, to obtain reliable results, the testing surface was
determined inside the plate, which was evenly divided by the geo-
metric centre line (see Fig. 11(a)). Notably, the S22 distributions (as
presented in Fig. 11(b-e)) demonstrated the same development
trend as the equivalent stress given above. Furthermore, the length
from the inner edge to the SNL reduced from 1133.8 to 1082.7 mm
when the temperature increased from 850 to 1000 °C, which indi-
cates the SNL tends to move to the compression zone but not at the
geometric centre line. The SNL was reported to transfer to the
inside layer at room-temperature bending process [48], while
was rarely mentioned in high-temperature deformation even
though the SNL presented the same moving tendency in these
two conditions. On the contrary, the plate thickness was increased
with the increase of bending temperatures owing to the enhanced
material flowability, leading to a more uniform plate thickness and
stress distribution [49]. Thus, there is a new finding that SNL pre-
fers moving to the compression zone with the increase of temper-
ature in the hot bending operations. In addition, SNL would be
responsible for a relatively smaller value of hardness in the middle

10
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
region throughout the plate thickness. It has been proposed by Li
et.al [48] that the SNL is dependent on some integrated factors
such as the type of alloy, accumulated plastic strain, deformation
mechanism. Besides, in industrial production, SNL as an important
indicator significantly affects the straightness precision, roller
design, and forming parameters of bar [50].
4.2. Effect of dislocation pile-up in the bending process
As mentioned above, the substructures could be detected more
at a relatively lower bending temperature based on the KAM maps
due to the significant impact of strain partitioning and heterogene-
ity of microstructure. To directly calculate dislocations accumula-
tion, geometrically necessary dislocations (GND) density can be
applied according to KAM results [30]. Normally, it is unacceptable
to calculate the local misorientation when random misorientations
were greater than 2°, thus the calculation of local misorientation is
ruled by the average misorientation from a central pixel to the
neighbour pixels [30,51], which is expressed as the equation:
X
8 X
8 Furthermore, since the smaller hardness was overall detected at
hlocal ¼ hn  Iðhn <£Þ = Iðhn <£Þ
n¼1 n¼1
where hn means the misorientation between n pixel and its 8
neighbour pixels, £ represents the threshold 2°, and the indicator
Fig. 12. (a) GND density distribution of specimens bent at the temperatures of 850 °C, 900 °C, 950 °C, and 1000 °C, respectively; (b) grain boundary characteristic distributions
of the plate bent at 900 °C, concentrating on the middle area and the outer surface; and (c) local misorientation maps detected in the middle area and outer surface, and the
corresponding mean local strain for each testing region.
Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
function is expressed as Iðhn <£Þ . In addition, the distribution of the
GND density of a pixel is exhibited as the following equation:
2h
qGND ¼ ð2Þ
ub
where h is the obtained local misorientation by KAM maps, u
refers to the mapping step size in EBSD, and b corresponds to the
Burger’s vector (FCC: 0.253 nm and BCC: 0.248 nm).
Fig. 12(a) identifies the statistical GND density distribution
under different bending conditions. Since the testing temperatures
were all over 850 °C, the bent plates have been fully austenitised
according to the phase diagram given in Fig. 2. It is apparent that
mean GND density continuously decreased from 17.08  1014
m2 to 15.86  1014 m2 with the increase of bending temperature.
This is because the experimental steel was with low austenitic SFE
at a higher forming temperature resulting from DRX. Inversely, the
larger GND density corresponding to a lower-temperature counter-
part was an indication of the high-temperature DRV [41], which
validates the statement regarding substructures in Section 3.5.
Thus, the enhanced strength at lower bending temperature was
ascribed to the dislocation pile-up.
ð1Þ the position nearby the central line throughout the thickness of all
bent plates, the plate bent at 900 °C was further selected for EBSD
mapping, which was carried out both on the middle area and outer
surface. This was attributed to the fact that the specimen at inter-
11
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al. Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458

Fig. 13. Reconstruction of parent austenite grains for the plates bent at: (a) 850 °C, (b) 900 °C, (c) 950 °C, (d) 1000 °C and (e) comparison of average austenite grain size in
different regions of the plate bent at 900 °C.

Fig. 14. Comparison of the martensite packet size of the plates bent at (a) 850 °C, (b) 900 °C, (c) 950 °C, and (d) 1000 °C.

mediate temperatures of the current work was relatively less
affected by both DRV and DRX. The comparison of misorientation
angle distribution in the regions of the middle area and the outer
surface was plotted in Fig. 12(b). As discussed in Section 3.4, LAGB
occupied a higher proportion on the position of the outer surface,
indicating the larger the dislocation density. Additionally, based
12
on the local misorientation maps in these two regions shown in
Fig. 12 (c), the mean local strains outputted from the outer surface
stated a bit higher value. Reports [16,32] suggested that lower
temperatures refer to higher local strains during the hot deforma-
tion process since more plastic strain needs to be transformed,
which is consistent with the results in regard to high-
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
temperature DRV discussed above. At the same time, the local
strain intensity would be influenced by the true strain and plastic
strain degree during austenitic compression, as well. This may fur-
ther clarify the local strain in different regions is different even in
the same bending specimen. Thus, dislocations are expected to
accumulate in tension or compression zones due to prominent
DRV in this case, resulting in the hardness gradient as identified
in Fig. 4.
4.3. Role of prior austenite (PA) grains in the bending process
Lots of work have been reported concerning the microstructural
evolution of carbon steels after a hot deformation process [30–
32,52–55], while the comparison of high-temperature microstruc-
tures was rarely mentioned. In this study, the reconstructed
austenite grains were successfully carried out by the MTEX tech-
nique on EBSD mapping figures, as shown in Fig. 13. Note that,
the predicted PA grain was coarsened with the increase of temper-
ature (see Fig. 13(a-d)). This may suggest that grain boundary
migration was promoted at elevated temperatures, leading to the
acceleration of PA nucleation rate and grain growth [32]. Since
the DRX grains have been well accepted to form along with the
inwardly concave interfaces of PA grains [56], the observation of
tiny grains on the boundary of PA was the indication of DRX grains
during the bending process. With the development of grain bound-
ary migration, a steady equiaxed microstructure would be finally
obtained. Notably, the higher bending temperatures directly
Fig. 15. Martensite variants and the corresponding pole figures in selected PA grains of the plates bent at (a) 850 °C, (b) 900 °C, (c) 950 °C, and (d) 1000 °C.
13
Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
improve the grain size of DRX (see Fig. 13(d)). It has also been
reported that the forming temperature would accelerate the DRX
progress [16,32], leading to the smaller hardness value detected
at higher bending temperatures.
Furthermore, PA distribution has been predicted on the middle
region and outer surface from the same bent plate, as shown in
Fig. 13(e). Results revealed that the average PA grain size exhibited
a little deviation, which was 12.76 mm on the middle area and
12.83 mm on the outer surface, respectively. According to grain
statistics, it can be speculated that the effect of DRV is greater than
that of DRX in different regions of the same sample.
4.4. Effect of martensite packet in the bending process
It has been primarily proposed that PA grain can be classified
into packets [21,57], and each unique packet is split into blocks,
sub-blocks and laths. Lath is normally defined to be the basic/finest
unit of martensite, which is independent of each other and deter-
mined by low-angle boundaries (over 10.53°) [21]. Fig. 14 presents
the predicted distribution of martensite packets under different
bending temperatures. It is apparent that the overall packet size
was improved with the increase of bending temperature, especially
when the temperature increased to 1000 °C, the packet sizes of
No.2 and No.4 (circled in Fig. 14(d)) increased significantly com-
pared with other bent plates. The significant influence of marten-
site block and packet size on strength and toughness has been
validated on some metal materials, such as low-carbon steels
Y. Lu, H. Xie, J. Wang et al.
[21] and Fe-C alloys [22]. Accordingly, investigating the evolution
of crystallographic and morphological characteristics of martensite
in the experimental steel is of great importance to explain the
hardness transition under different bending temperatures. Reports
revealed that the size of the martensite variant and the size of the
packet in which the variant is located have a more close impact on
the mechanical properties of the material [58,59], and the
decreased packet size would increase the strength of steels with
LM structure [21]. Consequently, in addition to the influence of
SNL, high-temperature DRV (related to dislocation), PA grain size,
and DRX mentioned above, another dominant factor that would
bring a difference in strength is martensite packet size.
4.5. Evolution of martensite variants in the bending process
As discussed in Section 3.7 that any absent variants were specu-
lated as a natural phenomenon due to the lack of transformation
space [45]. However, no further clarification has been concerned
before due to the complicated progress to detect the martensite vari-
ants using a traditional method in a single PA grain, as given above.
To observe the martensite variants under different conditions, the
MTEX toolbox was carried out to achieve this analysis. Based on
the existing theoretical variants relationship given in Fig. 10,
Fig. 15 further compares the variants evolution inside PA grains
under different forming temperatures. Obviously, most martensite
variants were generated in larger PA grains regardless of the bending
temperatures (see Fig. 15 (b-d)), meanwhile, some variants disap-
peared in the smaller PA grains. This may suggest the larger PA size
would provide enough nucleation space for the martensite struc-
ture. However, it is not so absolute because a relatively smaller PA
grain displayed left-side in Fig. 15(a) contained more variants, which
further verifies the natural phenomenon that the generation of
martensite variants is independent of forming process.
5. Conclusions
In this study, a newly designed austenitising bending was suc-
cessfully carried out by the thermomechanical simulator. The dif-
ferent quenching temperatures were applied in high strength
quenched and micro-alloyed steel to investigate microstructural
and mechanical evolution. The major conclusions are listed below:

No obvious defects and spring-back can be observed when the
forming temperature was selected to be over austenitic trans-
formation temperature. The obtained results are instructive
for the actual manufacturing process of spring fasteners due
to the high consistency between experiments and simulation.

The strength of the experimental steel decreased with the
increase of bending temperatures. The high-temperature DRV
corresponding to dislocation accumulation should be mainly
responsible for this, which was identified by LAGB, KAM, GNDs,
and TEM observation. Besides, the generated twin microstruc-
ture is also beneficial for the improvement of strength. Further-
more, more DRX results in decreased hardness at elevated
temperatures.

Austenite reconstruction was applied for the first time to reflect
the high-temperature microstructural evolution. Through this,
results revealed that grain boundary migration was promoted
at elevated temperatures, leading to grain growth and severe
DRX. Nevertheless, the LM and BF as the final microstructures
would be promoted due to the effects of DRX at a higher
temperature.

SNL tended to move to the compression zone during straining,
which was considered to be one important factor of smaller
hardness nearby the middle area throughout the plate thick-
14
Materials & Design 215 (2022) 110458
ness. While the more dislocation pile-ups on the surface areas
would be another reason for the improved hardness value.

Martensite packet displayed smaller size at a lower tempera-
ture, leading to a larger hardness, as well. However, no evidence
shows the correlation between martensite variants and
strength. The absent variants were not entirely dependent on
the PA size and were considered to be natural phenomenon.
Data availability
All data included in the current work are available upon request
by contacting the corresponding author.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Yao Lu: Methodology, Data curation, Writing – original draft.
Haibo Xie: Investigation. Jun Wang: Writing – review & editing,
Methodology. Fanghui Jia: Investigation. Zhou Li: Methodology.
Hamidreza Kamali: Software. Jianzhong Xu: Resources. Jingtao
Han: Conceptualization, Supervision, Methodology. Zhengyi Jiang:
Supervision, Writing – review & editing, Project administration.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
The authors are so grateful for the financial support from the
Australian Research Council (ARC) ITTC-Rail centre at the Univer-
sity of Wollongong (UOW). The authors are thankful for the sup-
port of the industrial partner: the Innovative Technology Beijing
Company. The authors also appreciate Dr Azdiar A. Gazder’s full
support in the austenite reconstruction.
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