STEELS, CARBON CONCENTRATION, AND MICROHARDNESS

A simplified method for the quantitative analysis of carbon in steels is presented. It is based on the use of two steel standards and a line ar interpolation between their carbon concentrations. With this method only x-ray intensity measurements at the C-K-alpha wavelength are nec essary and background measurements are superfluous. The method is used to measure carbon concentration profiles in case hardened steels and to correlate these with corresponding microhardness profiles.