Effects of hot rolling and subsequent tempering on particle erosion behavior of SUS403 martensitic stainless steel

The effects of hot rolling and subsequent tempering on particle erosion behavior of SUS403 MSS were investigated as a function of impact angle, reduction and grain size. The results indicated that, cutting is the dominant wear mode for material removal at oblique impact angle. At the higher impact angle, the mode is based on extrusion and cracking. However, at the medium impact angle, the wear is dominated by mode mixed with cutting and extrusion. The characteristics of the cracking are more obvious with increasing impact angle. The erosion rates of all reduction samples increase first and then decrease with increasing impact angle. The maximum erosion rate occurs at the angle of 45 degrees. After hot rolling, grain refining has an effect on decreasing erosion rates in comparison to the direct quenched and tempered samples. Fine grain associated with high density of grain boundary and with strengthening effect in mechanical properties retards the cracking and then decreases the erosion rate. The effect of grain refining on decreasing erosion rate is more obvious with increasing both the impact angle and the reduction. At the normal impact angle, the percentage of decrement of erosion rate is approximately 45% when the material was rolled with 50% reduction. Increasing in the mechanical properties including hardness, ductility, tensile strength and toughness are contributed to decreasing the erosion rate.