Effects of High Magnetic Field Heat Treatment on the Microstructure of Fe-0.76%C Alloy

The present studies are to investigate the microstructure features during transformation from austenite to ferrite without and with magnetic field on Fe-0.76%C alloy. It is found that the area fraction and numbers of proeutectoid ferrite grain as well as the lamellar spacing of pearlite in Fe-0.76%C alloy increased considerably with the increase of magnetic field intensity. The reason is that, the magnetic field increases the driving force of proeutectoid ferrite nuclei and shifts the eutectoid point to the side of high carbon content and high temperature, which increases the starting-temperature of the transformation from austenite to ferrite. The proeutectoid ferrite grains are elongated along the magnetic field direction, which can be explained as follows: the proeutectoid ferrite becomes the magnetic dipolar under high magnetic field, and then the polarized austenite atoms are much easier to diffuse into ferrite grains along the magnetic field direction. Key words: high magnetic field; Fe-0.76%C alloy; microstructure