A new view on transformation induced plasticity (TRIP)

The phenomenon of transformation induced plasticity (TRIP) in steel is rein vestigated both experimentally and theoretically. The irreversible length c hange (TRIP strain) consists not only of a plastic contribution ("Greenwood -Johnson" effect) but also of a contribution due to the length change cause d by the transformation shear component of the martensitic variants (orient ation effect or "Magee" effect). This orientation effect, which is fully ac cepted for shape memory alloys, is explained for steels. Micromechanical in vestigations help to quantify the orientation effect. Finally a proposal fo r a modified constitutive law for elastic plastic phase changing materials is presented. (C) 2000 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserv ed.