Influence of nitrogen on the mechanism of austenitic stainless steel hardening

On the example of a C18N12M2 austenitic stainless steel, the influence of nitrogen (whose content varied from 0 to 0.45 wt. %) on the grain boundary hardening coefficient Ah entering into the Hall-Patch equation is analyzed. High values o/4 in steels with and without nitrogen are found. The data of the Auger analysis show that the hardening coefficient in the steel without nitrogen is determined by the grain-boundary segregation of carbon and oxygen. The grain-boundary hardening in the steel with nitrogen is not connected with the predominant segregation of nitrogen at grain boundaries. It is completely governed by intragranular processes - interaction of nitrogen atoms with dislocations. © 1999 Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.