The article presents the influence of structure formation on the properties of 321 metastable austenitic stainless steel in the process of cold radial forging (CRF). The steel under study after austenitization was subjected to CRF at room temperature with degrees of true strain (e) 0.26, 0.56, 1.00, 1.71 and 2.14. It has been shown that structure formation of the studied steel during CRF consists of three stages: formation of the lamellar structure of austenite, formation of the trapezoidal structure, and formation of the equiaxial grain structure. The kinetics of the strain-induced α'-martensitic transformation is related to the stages of structure evolution. Hardness, ultimate tensile strength and yield strength uniformly increase in all stages of structure formation with a significant decrease of elongation to fracture during the first stage of structure formation while the value of elongation to fracture remains constant in the subsequent stages of deformation. Impact strength of fatigue cracked specimens (KCT) decreases sharply at the first stage of structure formation and smoothly increases at the second and third stages. However, the impact strength of V-notch specimens (KCV) continuously decreases when deformation degree increases in the overall investigated deformation range.
Keywords: band structure; cold radial forging; impact strength; metastable austenitic stainless steel; strain-induced martensitic transformation; strengthening; twinning.