High Strength Steels for Wheel Use

During the past few years, an application of high strength steels to wheels of passenger cars has been developed. Two big problems associated with the materials were noted with attempts to apply the high strength steels to wheels. One relates to properties required for wheel use and other relates to consistency of the properties. Reserch on the properties required for wheel use revealed that good formability is required for disc use materials and good formability both at base metal and flash-butt welded portion is required for rim use materials. It was found that good consistency of the mechanical properties over the entire portion of a coil and among coils is very important to reduce scrap ratio in wheel manufacturing process. Based on the results, high strength steels for wheel use were developed. This paper describes the properties and manufacturing process of the steels.