An inverse approach to determine the non-linear properties of induction heat-treated steels

The identification of the through-the-thickness variation of the non-linear properties of a steel structure due to a heat treatment by induction is considered. An inverse approach to that problem is proposed, which is based on a 4-point bending test of a heat-treated parallelepipedic bar. It includes a layer-removal method for measuring residual stresses. Precisely, two different inverse methods are described. For a medium carbon steel, an application based on experimental data is performed, which shows the efficiency of our approach and a good agreement between the two methods.