Effects of rolling and heat treatment on hydrogen embrittlement in medium-Mn steel

Abstract Three types of medium-Mn steels were prepared, i.e., HR-QT with hot rolling - quenching - tempering, and WR5-CA/WR1-CA with warm rolling - soft annealing (5 h for WR5-CA and 1 h for WR1-CA) - cold rolling - annealing. HR-QT exhibited significant hydrogen embrittlement (HE). Warm and cold rolling processes were carried out to eliminate the prior austenite grain boundaries. 1 h soft annealing process before the cold rolling and intercritical annealing after it were carried out to achieve a homogeneous microstructure. It was observed that WR1-CA exhibited the lowest HE susceptibility. Thus, in this study, we report a convenient strategy for improving the HE resistance of medium-Mn steels.