Elastic Precursor Attenuation in Iron and Steels

The phenomenon of the elastic precursor attenuation in armco-iron and steels with different initial hardness and addition composition is experimentally investigated. The influence of the initial defect structure in materials on the precursor amplitude, the front form and the rate of the stress drop in the precursor is noted. The experimental results description is given by means of the statistical and kinetic model. From the obtained estimations it follows that the main stress drop in the precursor takes place in the zone close to the superficial zone of the sample.