Abstract
Austenitic manganese steel has a high toughness, high ductility, high strain hardening capacity and excellent
wear resistance, the material is mostly used in the mining industry for crushing and loading equipment. High manganese
steel shows superior wear resistance when used under primary crushing system than when used under secondary and
tertiary modes of crushing. This work presents the effect of vanadium content on the mechanical properties and
microstructure evaluation of high manganese steel. The addition of vanadium to high manganese steels has a direct
increase on the hardness and wear resistance. Impact testing for alloys containing vanadium showed low impact energies
compared to the standard manganese steel. The increase in hardness and the wear resistance of the alloys was explained
on the basis of vanadium carbide which had formed on the austenitic matrix. It was observed that the carbon and vanadium
content will have an effect on the mechanical properties of high manganese steel alloyed with vanadium. Microstructural
examination showed that the size and distribution of vanadium carbides has an effect on the mechanical properties and
the wear behaviour. Therefore, this work shows that the addition of vanadium to high manganese steel will increase the
hardness and wear resistance while decreasing the impact energy of high manganese steel alloyed with vanadium.