Istrazivanja i projektovanja za privreduJournal of Applied Engineering Science

ENHANCing S45C STEEL FOR THE PRIMARY COMPONENT OF AN AUTOMATIC COUPLER USING QUENCH-TEMPERing TECHNIQUES


DOI: 10.5937/jaes0-43988 
This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY 4.0
Creative Commons License

Volume 22 article 11180 pages: 215-222

Jean Mario Valentino
Graduate Program of Mechanical Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia; Research Center for Transportation Technology, National Research and Innovation Agency, Jakarta, Indonesia

Agus Sigit Pramono*
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia

Achmad Syaifudin
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia

Helena Kis Agustin
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia

Lukman Shalahuddin
Research Center for Transportation Technology, National Research and Innovation Agency, Jakarta, Indonesia

Agus Windharto
Department of Industrial Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia

Katsuhiko Sasaki
Faculty of Engineering, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan

Coupling links and hooked plates constitute the primary components of automatic couplers in trains, enduring substantial tensile and compressive loads during train connections. This study endeavours to enhance the strength of S45C material through heat treatment techniques. The research commenced with the preparation of JIS S45C tensile test specimens adhering to ASTM E8 standards. The material's chemical composition was validated using an Optical Emission Spectrometer (OES). Six heat treatment variations were employed, including quench oil without tempering (QO), quenching water without tempering (QW), quenching oil tempered at 660°C (QOT660), quenching water tempered at 660°C (QWT660), quenching oil tempered at 550°C (QOT550), quenching water tempered at 550°C (QWT550), alongside untreated conditions (NT) for comparison. The efficacy of heat treatment was evaluated through tensile testing, optical metallographic analysis, and micro-Vickers hardness tests. QO and QW scenarios were excluded from the tensile tests. Results revealed that QWT550 demonstrated the most substantial enhancement in material yield, exhibiting a 115% increase. Furthermore, hardness testing indicated superior hardness in QWT550 specimens compared to other tempered variants. The metallographic analysis illustrated the formation of identical and smooth martensitic structures. Overall, the combination of cooling heat treatment and tempering proved sufficient to meet the design requirements of hooked plates and coupling links for automatic couplers.

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