LAUSR

Abstract The microstructures and impact properties of the heat affected zone (HAZ) in steel treated by rare earth (RE) under different welding processes were discussed. The effect of Al on the impact properties of the HAZ in RE treated steel was analyzed. It finds that when the welding t8/5 is smaller than 111 s, the main microstructure in steels is bainite/widmanstatten. The impact toughness of the HAZ is lower than that of the steel matrix. When t8/5 is more than 250 s, the microstructure is mainly acicular ferrite (AF) in the steel treated by RE, and the impact toughness of HAZ is obviously improved. Even under the welding processing with t8/5 about 600 s in RE treated steel can still obtain a lot of AF. While in the steel killed by Al and treated by RE, the main microstructure is parallel cluster of bainite/widmanstatten, and the impact toughness of HAZ is significantly lower than that of low-Al RE treated steel. Al can deteriorate the optimizing of RE treatment on HAZ.