Tailoring the Mechanical Properties of a Twinning-Induced Plasticity Steel by Retention of Deformation Twins During Heat Treatment

The relation between microstructure and mechanical properties of a 30 pct cold-rolled, recovery-annealed, and recrystallization-annealed Fe-23Mn-1.5Al-0.3C twinning-induced plasticity (TWIP) steel was studied. The thermal stability of deformation-induced twin boundaries along with a reduced dislocation density due to annihilation during recovery annealing at 903 K (630 A degrees C) was found to be a simple, promising processing route to overcome the shortcoming of low yield strength usually associated with TWIP steels.