Microstructure, mechanical, ballistic property evaluation of RHA steel produced by continuous-casting route

Abstract

This paper presents the commercial production of rolled homogeneous armour steel with 5 different thicknesses i.e. 20,30,40,50 and 80 mm through continuous casting route. All the plates display tempered martensitic structure. Tensile and charpy impact properties are obtained for all the different thickness plates. It is observed that the produced steel shows a good combination of strength and impact toughness. For ballistic evaluation 30 mm thick plates are impacted with 30 mm medium caliber armour piercing steel projectiles at a velocity of 460±20 m/s at zero degree angle of impact. Depth of penetration method is used to measure the ballistic performance of the plates. From the post ballistic microstructural observations, an adiabatic shear band induced material removal is detected in the front face of the impacted rolled homogeneous armour steel plates. The microstructure, mechanical and ballistic properties of the continuous cast steel is compared with the steel produced by conventional ingot cast route.