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Forschungsverbund für den massiven Leichtbau Forschungsvereinigung Stahlanwendung e. V. (FOSTA) Arbeitsgemeinschaft Wärmebehandlung und Werkstofftechnik e. V. Forschungsgesellschaft Stahlverformung e. V. Forschungsvereinigung Antriebstechnik e.V

SP 1: Ultra-high-strength lightweight steels

for alternative heat treatment and for the cold forging of parts in the powertrain of passenger cars. ( P 1055 / Pre-Competitive Cooperative Industrial Research Project (IGF) No. 24 LN) IEHK, IWT, FZG

The first subproject of the “massiverLEICHTBAU” (Lightweight Forging) research project deals with the research and development of new, innovative materials. The close collaboration among the project partners from the “Department of Ferrous Metallurgy” (Institut für Eisenhüttenkunde – IEHK) in Aachen, the “Foundation Institute of Materials Science” (Stiftung Institut für Werkstofftechnik – IWT) in Bremen and the “Gear Research Centre” (Forschungsstelle für Zahnräder und Getriebebau – FZG) in Munich enables research in the following two focal areas:

The first focus lies in the further development and optimization of the alloying concept and the subsequent heat treatment of case-hardening steels as well as quenched and tempered steels which are already in use. The goal here is to tap new lightweight design potential by increasing the strength of the parts. The benchmark is the high-performance material M50NiL, which is case-hardened and plasma-nitrided. The first innovative process to undergo analyses will be “boriding”. This should generate extremely hard and wear-resistant surfaces, thereby significantly increasing the power density of common materials. For the familiar process of “carbonitriding”, a specially adapted new case-hardening steel will be developed which achieves maximum strengths and high toughness through the combination of niobium and vanadium with the carbon and nitrogen introduced during the carbonitriding process.

The second focus will involve the production of new steels with a medium manganese content for the subprojects to follow. These steels correspond to the current state of research in cold forging but are not yet commercially available. In pilot tests, the entire process chain from casting and heat treatment to forging will be represented.

You can find the report on our Institute page here.