The Influence of Controlled Rolling and Cooling on Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of Marine Steel

A microstructure consisted of granular bainite, upper bainite, acicular ferrite, polygonal ferrite, and a little of pearlite was obtained by controlling rolling and cooling in marine steel. The grain size of the two steels was refined to 5-9 μm. The size of the MA island was about 3-6 μm. Both steels had higher tensile strength, yield strength, elongation and hardness, and the performance of steel B was better than that of steel A. Both steels exhibited large and deep dimples at -80 °C impact fracture. The longitudinal impact energy of the specimens was above 250J, and the steel B even exceeded 300J. Its longitudinal impact performance was better than lateral impact performance. Both steels had achieved good performance due to fine grain strengthening, MA island strengthening, precipitation strengthening and dislocation strengthening caused by controlled rolling and cooling. The alloying element nickel effectively improved the low temperature impact toughness of the experimental steel. Excellent impact energy of both steels was attributed to higher texture strength for RD specimens.