Study on the Perspective of Mechanical Properties and Corrosion Behaviour of Stainless Steel, Plain and TMT Rebars

In the present research, the effects of various alloying elements and microstructural constituents on the mechanical properties and corrosion behaviour have been studied for four different rebars. The microstructures of stainless steel and plain rebar primarily reveal equiaxed ferrite grains and ferrite-pearlite microstructures, respectively, with no evidence of transition zone, whereas tempered martensite at the outer rim, followed by a narrow bainitic transition zone with an internal core of ferrite-pearlite, has been observed for the thermomechanically treated (TMT) rebars. The hardness profiles obtained from this study display maximum hardness at the periphery, which decreases gradually towards the centre, thereby providing the classical U-shaped hardness profile for TMT rebars. The tensile test results confirm that stainless steel rebar exhibits the highest combination of strength (≈755 MPa) and ductility (≈27%). It has been witnessed that in Tafel plots, the corrosion rate increases for all the experimental rebars in 1% HCl solution, which is well expected because the acid solutions generally possess a higher corrosive environment than seawater (3.5% NaCl) due to their acidic nature and lower pH values. However, all the experimental results obtained from Tafel and Nyquist plots correlate well for both 1% HCl and 3.5% NaCl solutions.