Ratcheting Assessment of Medium Carbon and Austenitic Steel Alloys at Elevated Temperatures

The present study intends to evaluate the ratcheting of ER9 wheel medium carbon steel and austenitic steel samples at room and elevated temperatures subjected to uniaxial loading cycles through the use of the Ahmadzadeh–Varvani (A–V) kinematic hardening rule. The A–V framework incorporated an exponential function in the dynamic recovery term to account for the dynamic strain aging (DSA) phenomenon at temperatures where solute atoms and moving dislocations showed increased interaction. Within the DSA domain at 573K for ER9 wheel steel samples, and at 423K for austenitic steel samples, the collision of carbon and nitrogen solute atoms with moving dislocations resulted in the materials hardening, and promoted the yield strength. The Voyiadjis–Song–Rusinek (VSR) multivariable model was used to capture the evolution of yield strength with temperature. The predicted ratcheting results within the DSA temperature domain were in close agreement with those of measured values.