Designing Fe–Mn–Si alloys with improved low-cycle fatigue lives

A new design concept for improving the low-cycle fatigue lives of Fe–Mn–Si-based alloys is proposed. The degree of reversibility of the dislocation motion can be increased by setting the stacking fault energy to approximately 20 mJ m−2, enhancing the Ni-equivalent amounts with respect to the Cr-equivalent amounts and setting the Si concentration to 4 wt.%. Under these conditions, an Fe–15Mn–10Cr–8Ni–4Si alloy with a low-cycle fatigue life of approximately 8000 cycles for a total strain range of 2.0% could be developed.