The hot deformation behavior of a nitrogen-bearing martensitic stainless steel was researched by the isothermal compression test in the temperature range of 950–1150 °C and strain rate range of 0.01–10 s⁻¹ with a Gleeble-3800 thermal-mechanical simulating tester. A strain compensated sine-hyperbolic Arrhenius-type constitutive equation was developed to describe the relationship between true stress and deformation parameters such as temperature, strain rate and true strain. The hot deformation activation energy is calculated to be from 407 to 487 KJ mol⁻¹. It is validated by the standard statistical parameters that the established constitutive equation can accurately predict the true stress. The processing maps at different true strains were constructed based on the dynamic material model (DMM) and the true stress data obtained from the hot compression tests. Two unstable regions which should be avoided during hot working were observed from the processing map. In addition, the optimum hot working parameters are located in the domain of 1000–1150 °C/0.1–1 s⁻¹ with the peak power dissipation efficiency of 39.9%, in which complete dynamic recrystallization (DRX) occurs.

The effect of austenitising heat treatment on the microstructure, hardness and metal release of the nitrogen bearing, martensitic stainless steel 420U6 was investigated. The heat treatment was carried out at temperatures between 950 to 1,150∘C with a holding time between 30 to 120min, followed by air cooling. The quenched microstructures observed by a scanning electron microscope indicated that by increasing the austenitising temperature and holding time, the number of carbides decreases while the grain size and the amount of retained austenite increases. For a given holding time, the hardness increases to a peak and then decreases continuously with the increase of temperature. The metal release test, according to the GB 4806.9-2016 standard, reveals that the metal release concentration is highly affected by the austenitising temperature. The parameters of the austenitising heat treatment, which can achieve the optimum combination of hardness and metal release, were obtained.