Improvement of thermocyclic treatment technology to increase wear resistance of gears

Abstract

The technology of thermocyclic treatment of fine‑module gears has been improved, which makes it possible to increase their wear resistance by 30–40 %. Gears were subjected to preliminary cyclic heating and subsequent impulse hardening. In all cases of hardening, a martensitic structure is formed, which provides high rigidity of the material. The sizes of martensitic plates depend on the heating temperature during quenching. During cyclic heat treatment up to a temperature of 450 °C, the sizes of austenite grains and martensite plates did not depend on temperature.

Keywords

• thermal cycling
• dislocation density
• low‑alloy steel
• wear resistance
• impulse hardening
• defects
• crystal structure