Heat Treatment of WC-Co Hardmetals and Transformation Temperature of Cobalt Phase

The Present work has found that the transverse rupture strength of WC-Co hardmetals can be improved by queuching heat treatment. The increment of transverse rupture strength （ΔTRS） was dependent on the cobalt content of hardmetal. The higher the cobalt content of hardmetal is, the more the increment of transverse rupture strength is. The main reason is that the transformation of face centered cubic cobalt stabilized at high temperature to hexagonal close packed cobalt can be depressed by quenching. The transformation temperature of hexagonal close packed cobalt binder phase was determined by differential thermal analysis. It was found that the transformation temperature increases with increase of cobalt content of hardmetal. The reason is that the cobalt binder phase of high cobalt hardmetal contains higher tungsten content than that of low cobalt hardmetal after quenching.