BARKHAUSEN EFFECT IN-GROUND STEELS

Grinding industry needs a fast, reliable and non-destructive inspectio n tool to detect the grinding damage at the rate of production. Barkha usen emission is shown to be effective for this purpose. In this inves tigation, a varying amount of surface damage was induced in the ground steels by changing the coolant flow rate during grinding. The Barkhau sen effect signal emitted from the surface of these steel samples corr elated well with the coolant flow rate. The samples were further analy zed for grinding damage, namely residual stress and micro-hardness, us ing conventional methods, X-ray and micro-hardness tester. A consisten t change in the Barkhausen effect signal was observed with the changes in residual stress and micro-hardness. It appears that the Barkhausen technique could be a viable technique to detect the degree of grindin g damage in steel components at a rate fast enough to match the produc tion rate. (C) 1997 Acta Metallurgica Inc.