Weldability and mechanical behavior of laser-welded TRIP 750 steel sheets

Transformation-induced plasticity steels have been developed and widely applied in the automotive and aerospace industries. They exhibit ductility and mechanical strength associated with a high formability due to their complex microstructure of bainite-associated pro-eutectoid ferrite and significant retained austenite fractions. The weldability of these steels is limited by the high content of alloying elements in the composition, causing the thermal cycle to modify the carefully designed microstructure, which in turn generates unsatisfactory weld mechanical properties. Laser welding has a relatively low thermal input, and, therefore, a narrow heat-affected zone is obtained. As known, the literature had not been definitively reported the microstructural features of the fusion and the heat-affected zones after laser welding of TRIP steels in conjunction with their mechanical behavior. The aim of the present work is to characterize the microstructure and mechanical behavior of laser-welded TRIP steel after uniaxial tensile and Erichsen formability tests. The coupons of TRIP 750 steel sheets were subjected to different laser welding conditions in order to analyze their impact on the microstructure, hardness, and mechanical strength of the material. After some preliminary tests, the laser power was fixed at 900 W and the weld speed fixed at 50 mm/s as the best choice of operating parameters. Under these conditions, the fusion zone was almost completely martensitic, while the heat-affected zone had a mixture of ferrite and martensite. The martensite transformation is corroborated by finite elements analyses as the cooling rate was 4200 °C/s for material at martensite start temperature. The average hardness of the fusion zone was 530 HV and the heat-affected zone was 550 HV, compared with 270 HV of the base material. In terms of mechanical behavior, the tensile strength of the welded coupons was found to reach 740 MPa and the ductility reached 22% in uniform deformation. The Erichsen index for the welded sheets attained 15 mm for a load of 48.5 kN, similar with the non-welded base material. Both in the case of the uniaxial tensile testing and in the Erichsen testing, the fracture occurred in the base material away from the weld, showing a good toughness of the welded component.