Innovative X-ray diffraction and micromagnetic approaches for reliable residual stress assessment in deep rolled and microfinished AISI 4140 components

The residual stress state in the subsurface is a key element of surface integrity. It is well known to have a significant impact on a component's properties in terms of fatigue behavior and resistance to wear and corrosion. For this reason, adjusting residual stresses during manufacturing is a major challenge in modern production engineering, to improve and ensure a component's fatigue strength. In this context, hydrostatic deep rolling of the workpiece surface using adapted parameters enables the targeted induction of compressive residual stresses into subsurface layers. Due to specific properties regarding subsurface and topography for functional components in tribological applications, a further machining operation by microfinishing following deep rolling seems to be purposeful. In particular with regard to the production of components exposed to periodic load changes when used, the process combination can enable a substitution of the typically required conventional subsurface zone hardening. With the aim of economical process design, the corresponding parts can be manufactured with significantly reduced time and costs. Efficient and well-founded methods for monitoring the resulting influence on the subsurface zone properties are essential for a reproducible and target-oriented process design. The prevailing method for the non-destructive assessment of residual stresses in both academia and industry is X-ray diffractometry using the sin(2) Psi-method. However, this method is time-intensive and requires complex instrumentation. Thus, efforts have been undertaken in past decades to develop alternative methods for the efficient and reliable characterization of residual stresses. In this research, the applicability of the cos alpha-method in X-ray diffractometry and a micromagnetic approach for residual stress assessment was investigated, analyzing deep rolled and microfinished AISI 4140 specimen conditions. In addition to the diffractometric and micromagnetic measurements, metallographic and topographic analyses of machined surfaces were carried out. Deep rolling was found to induce significant compressive residual stresses of up to -1100 MPa. After microfinishing of the deep rolled surfaces, favorable compressive residual stresses remain in the sub-surface, reaching approximately up to -750 MPa. Based on this, the production of tailored surfaces with respect to a suitable combination of topography and subsurface is possible. For all surface states investigated, a good agreement between the two approaches in X-ray diffraction was found. Magnetic Barkhausen noise (MBN) measurements prove to be well applicable for an efficient and holistic assessment of surface integrity in the subsurface of deep rolled and microfinished AISI 4140 specimens. (C) 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V.