Enhanced Fatigue Property of Welded S355J2W Steel by Forming a Gradient Nanostructured Surface Layer

Welded joints are usually characterized by microstructural and compositional inhomogeneities, which may significantly degrade their fatigue properties and result in unpredictable failures. The present work demonstrates a novel and simple method to effectively optimize the microstructure in the surface layer and promote the fatigue properties of welded specimens. By a recently developed approach—surface mechanical rolling treatment (SMRT), a gradient nanostructured surface layer is formed on welded S355J2W steel specimens. The mean grain size is refined to nanometer scale, and the hardness is significantly enhanced in the SMRT surface layer. Independent of the initially inhomogeneous microstructure and hardness distributions, the microstructure and hardness distributions in the surface layers are comparable on different zones of a welded specimen after SMRT with the same procedure. Consequently, fatigue property of the SMRT specimens is significantly enhanced relative to that of the as-welded specimens within the high cycle fatigue regime.