Experiment #1

Chemical attack applied to metallographic specimens

Objective
Identify the phases and microstructures of metallic specimens in the metallographic microscope.

Materials

Chemical reactant.
Ethanol.
Metallographic specimens of ferrous and nonferrous materials, the specimens should have.
shinning superficies (a mirror finished ).

Equipment

Fan (to inject warm air).

Work to do

Work in the specimens superficies.

Identify the microstructure of the metallographic specimens.

Technic
When the specimen superficies has a mirror finish, the superficies should be cleaned with ethanol,
and then is drying with the hot air injected by the fan. When the superficies have been dried we
should applied the chemical reactant, we need to know which kind of chemical reactant we are going
to use, because each material have a specific cleaning compound, but sometimes just some
chemicals are used for different materials.
With the chemical reactant working in the specimen surface, we should wait a few minutes after
remove the chemical compound.
Then, this compound is removed with cotton, the specimen is washed with alcohol and then is dried
with a hot air flow.
After this procedure the final step is see the microstructure using the metallographic microscope.

Results:
In the figure 1 we can see the finished in a) and the microstructure in b) for the ferrous specimen
(1018 steel). Looking the microstructure we can notes the proeutectoid ferrite and perlite. Then, in the
figure 2 we can see de same, the finished in a) and microstructure in b), but now is for the nonferrous
specimen (Cu-Sn). Looking the microstructure we can notes that betha phases are the dark parts and
alfa phases are the white parts.

a)
b)
Figure 1. Finished and microstructure, in a) and b) respectively.

a)
b)
Figure 2. Finished and microstructure, in a) and b) respectively.
Polished technic

We used a different polished technic, taking care of two things:

-The specimen should maintain a low temperature similar to the environmental temperature.
-The sandpaper should resist the operating conditions.
The technic consist in use a lathe, the steps followed are:
-The specimen should maintain a low temperature similar to the environmental temperature.
-The sandpaper should resist the operating conditions.

The technic consist in use a lathe, the steps followed are:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

The lathe is configured to operate at 100 rpm.

Set the specimen at the pegbox.
Cool the specimen with a constant flux of water.
Do a facing cut process.
The lathe is configured again to operate at 400 rpm.
Do a facing polish process with the first sandpaper. (Each process should take twenty
seconds).
7. Do a facing polish process with the second sandpaper.
8. Do a facing polish process with the last sandpaper.
9. Do a facing polish process with alumina in the turn table.
The whole technic of above is illustrate in the figure 3, where in a) we can see the lathe holding the
specimen, in b) and c) shows the lathe working and freshing the specimen with water, obviously
changing the sandpaper, and in d) shows the specimen doing to it the facing polish with alumina in
the turn table.

a)

b)

c)

d)
Fugure 3. Whole polish technic.

Experiment #2
Thermic treatments
Objective
Learn the methods and procedures of the different thermic treatments used to modify the original
properties of the material.

Materials

Metallographic specimen: (steel, brass, cooper, aluminum alloys).

Liquid solution of ammonium persulfate.
Liquid solution of fluorhydric acid.
Mix of Nitric acid and alcohol.
Cooling medium: water, salt, oil and sand.

Equipment

Rockwell hardness tester.

Vickers hardness tester.
Furnace.

Work to do
Get the hardness of the specific material used in this practice after and before the thermic treatment.
Classify and identify the phases and microstructures presents in the metallographic specimens after
and before the thermal treatment.

Technic
First we should get the hardness of the material; it will be the initial hardness of our initial material.
Under microscope we should determine the microstructure of the material after and before the
treatment.
Consulting the transformation graph and the phase diagrams, the temperature and the time of the
treatment are determined. After the thermal treatment the superficies is polished again.
The phases and the microstructure are determined again.
The new hardness is obtained.

Our thermical treatment for the ferrous specimen

Tempered with oil like cooling media
Application (Truck springs)
As we know, the tempered process will increase the material hardness. But a high hardness is
translated in a high fragility. Exist applications in which the fragility is not an important property of
service, for example, a shave knife shall be hard in order to preserve the edge sharp and the high
fragility of this knife is not considered because this kind of knives are never used under high forces.
But, also exist situations in which the fragility is very important, in our application, a soft steel is not
desirable because it has a high ductility, if we want to make truck springs this property give us
deformables springs which give like a result an useless suspension system.
But if we do a tempered treatment with a fast cooling process, the steel will present martensite in its
microstructure. Now the soft steel increase its hardness, but increase the fragility. Fragile steel is not
desirable because it will break under the application of an intense force, give like a result a useless
suspension system.
Is clear. A soft material will fail, but a hard steel will fail. Now the question is, how obtain the specific
steel for this use?
The answer is in the steel, in the alloy carbon contain, but the important part of the answer is in the
thermical treatment, specifically in the cooling
medium. If we cool the specimen in water is
predictable obtain martensite (obtaining a hard
material), but if we cool with a different medium,
the hardness will be different. In our case, the oil
cooling process will increase the hardness in a
desirable amount.
So, the truck spring is show in the figure 4.
Figure 4. Truck Spring.

So based on the figure 5, shows the stated and knowing material composition. Observing the iron
carbon diagram, the treatment temperature is defined, this temperature is 900C in a enough time to
get a temperature that is defined inside the austenite zone.
As we can see in the fugure 7a, the heating was made in the electrical furnace in a nonprotected
atmosphere.
Is important wait until the furnace indicates that the temperature was achieved.
Now, with the specimen at the increased austenizing temperature, the next step is put the specimen
in the cooling medium as we can see in the figure 7b, for this case this medium is oil.
After some hours the specimen has the environment temperature and is ready for the cleaning
process.
When the hot specimen is cooled in oil, an important layer of carbon and other compounds is formed
on the superficies of the specimen as we see in the figure 7c, if we took the Rockwell hardness with
this dirty specimen the Rockwell hardness will be an incorrect lecture, because the layer will absorb
part of the force applied in the hardness test.

Figure 6. Phase diagram of the steel.

a)

b)

c)
Figure 7. Specimen after the Thermical Treatment.

The figure 8 shows the microstructure after the chemical attack where we can see the much finer
ferrite structures with increased perlite.

Figure 8.

Increasing the amount of fine pearlite and

reducing the size of the visible grains, we have a
greater hardness but not so high as in cases
where the appearance of a high amount of
martensite occurs.
Now compared with ferrite structure and fine
pearlite we could find similar phases as it shows
in the figure 9.

Figure 9.
Now, the hardness obtained before and after treatment are show in the next table:
Hardness test taken:
Before the treatment:
After treatment:
One day before the treatment:

Rockwell B hardness
63-65
64-68.5
67-68.5

As we see the hardness of the material increases but in a lightly way. It is a expected result which
corroborates our assumptions.

Justificacion de resultados en espaol:

Al haber hecho un proceso de templado lo esperado es la obtencin de martencita en la
microestructura lo cual como se mostro anteriormente no fue del todo cierto, si no que se obtuvo
perlita fina, esto pudo ser debido a una descarburizacin en el material o bien a que la velocidad de
enfriamiento no fue la contemplada.
Del libro de Avner Metalurga Fsica se encontr la siguiente tabla:

Dicha tabla sugiere que el enfriamiento del acero en aceite lento oscila entre 36 y 32 grados
Farenheit por segundo es decir, aproximadamente entre 20 y 18 grados centgrados por segundo.
Ahora al observar un diagrama TTT para el acero

Se denota que durante los 10 primeros segundos del enfriamiento se reducen 200 grados lo que
coincide con el inicio de la transformacin de la Perlita gruesa para instantes despus terminar como
perlita fina

Our thermical treatment for the nonferrous specimen

Aging with air like cooling media
Application (Industrial valves, using environmental temperature fluid)
The bronzes are highly used in the field of engineering, in our case our starting material was perfect
for applications such as bearings however the hardness of this material was low, it means that its
ductility was high, the explanation of why a brass bearing must be soft is based on the fact that a hard
material will penetrate a soft material first, thus a hard material wears a soft
material first, in all bearings is desirable to replace a worn bearing before a
worn shaft.
As seen the original properties have their advantages but, what happens if
we make a bronze threaded?
A ductile material will give us a threaded that will deforms in presence of
high stress, this deformation will cause a fail in the threads. This is totally
undesirable, for this reason this aging treatment was done, our objective
was increase the bronze hardness. So, figure 10 shows the application of a
industrial valve.
Figure 10.
Based on the diagram in the figure 11
and taking the correct data for this
composition, the team choose a aging
treatment to increase the bronze
hardness.
This treatment should be made at 300C
for this case, we made the treatment al
350C to ensure the phase change.
After the cooling process, the specimen is
cleaned; the new microstructure is now
defined in the figure 12. We can see a
solid solution of solid betha, solid alpha
and the most important phase for this
case, the precipitate.

Figure 11.

Finally we do the hardness test, having the next results show in the table:
Rockwell hardness test
Before the treatment:
One our before the treatment:
Four hours before the treatment:
At nex day:

Hardness ranges Rockwell B obtained

15-17
22-25
25
27

As we can see the aging process is a successful way to get an increasing in the hardness, with these
results we confirm our initial assumptions.
Is important remember that the hardness will decrease with the time, in this case we only see a
increase in the hardness because the time between lectures was relatively short, for future hardness
test the values will be different and smaller than the initial and medium data.
Justificacion de resultados en espaol:
Como se mostro anteriormente el tratamiento propuesto fue el de endurecimiento por
envejecimiento, para lo cual es necesario que el diagrama de fases cumpla con lo siguiente
condicin:

Y se puede denotar que para la composicin planteada en el material no ferroso el diagrama cumple
con el limite de solubilidad y a la temperatura planteada, lo que nos da la certeza que el tratamiento
fue bien realizado.
Ahora bien al comparar la tabla de mediciones de dureza obtenida con un diagrama tpico de
endurecimiento por envejecimiento:

Se puede denotar que el diagrama sugiere que despus de cierto tiempo la dureza va aumentando
hasta llegar a un valor mximo esto debido a que la fase inestable se va estabilizando conforme
pasa el tiempo, para despus ir reduciendo gradualmente hasta llegar a un equilibrio, tal y como
sucede en la tabla presentada.