Some aspects of the cyclic behavior of twinning-induced plasticity steels

Aspects of the mechanical behavior and microstructure evolution during the cyclic loading of twinning-induced plasticity steels are considered in order to provide deeper insights into their good fatigue strength. Experiments on an Fe-0.3C-16Mn-1.5Al steel in the high-cycle fatigue regime have demonstrated the beneficial influence of grain refinement. In the presence of a large grain size, cyclic loading is found to lead to the generation of twins in addition to extended dislocations and planar dislocation arrays. (C) 2011 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.