Method for making a plated steel armouring wire for a flexible tubular pipe transporting hydrocarbons, and armoured pipe

A process for manufacturing plated-steel wire of the type in which a plating coating is intimately bonded by high pressure to a steel core, the method comprising selecting for the core having relatively moderate mechanical properties and being a hardenable steel, applying a plating metal coating to the core and intimately bonding the coating to the core forming a plated wire and applying a rapid high-temperature hardening step to the plated wire, which is accompanied by a controlled martensitic transformation, and then applying a tempering step to the wire.