| Low carbon grades of steel rods are used to produce finished products such as fine wire, coat hangers, staples, and roofing nails. These products are subject to ductility failures during production due to excessively high work hardening rates during wire drawing. The high work hardening rates are attributed to the presence of residuals, free nitrogen, or combinations thereof. This research concludes that the most cost-effective way to reduce the work hardening rate during wire drawing is to combine boron with nitrogen to form boron nitride, and thus reducing its work hardening contribution. The results of this study also conclude the following: (1) Boron/Nitrogen ratio is the more significant factor than rod tensile strength, which affects work hardening rate. Higher ratio is better in the 0.79 to 1.19 range. (2) Maintaining this narrow B/N range requires precise process control. (3) Process conditions such as dissolved oxygen (<25 ppm), carbon (≤0.05%) and ladle refining temperature (<2930°F) are necessary for optimizing boron recovery. (4) An average of 89% boron recovery is obtained with the above controlled process conditions. (5) Use of Boron has no adverse effects on the several metallurgical properties tested except with minor difficulty with scale for descaling.; North Star Steel Texas (North Star) benefited from this research by being able to provide a competitive edge in both quality and cost of its low carbon boron grades thus making North Star a preferred supplier of wire rod for these products. |
