Hard Broaching of Case Hardened SAE 5120

To achieve knowledge of the effects of broaching to the component and the influence on subsequent process steps such as heat treatment and hard machining, broaching experiments were performed on plates made of normalized case hardening steel SAE 5120 in [1], . To investigate the effect of heat treatment, five broaching variants of [1] were chosen and hardened with two different case hardening depths, which were observed for effects generated from the surface layer carbon fraction. The hardened variants were analyzed for distortion generated through the hardening step and the specimen subsequently underwent a hard broaching stage in dry machining conditions. The cutting forces were monitored in-process, and the residual stress of the machined surface was determined using X-ray diffraction after the experiment. Surface roughness measurements also complemented the results. The results indicated that the cutting forces depend on existing distortion and therefore the volume material removed. It can also be seen that there is little influence on cutting forces with rising cutting speeds. Compressive residual stresses were present after heat treatment, but turned into tensile residual stress states after hard broaching. Effects from different case hardening depths and cutting speeds in the formation of surface roughness and residual stress could not be detected.