Bake hardening behavior of TRIP and DP steels

The bake hardening (BH) behavior of transformation-induced plasticity (TRIP) and dual-phase (DP) steels after different prestrains was studied. The experimental results indicate that TRIP steel exhibits good BH ability while DP steel does not, and prestrain displays a strong effect on the BH values of both steels. The comparison of microstructures of the two steels showed that the hard second phase in the matrix might be harmful to the BH ability. For deformed specimens, baking resulted in a loss of uniform elongation, but there was no obvious decrease in uniform elongation for unprestrained specimens.