Modified electrically assisted (EA) rapid heating of Al-Si-coated hot stamping steel is suggested,and the intermetallic evolution in the coating during heating is experimentally investigated.In the modified EA rapid heating,a continuous electric current for a suitable duration is applied to a specimen to heat it to a temperature slightly below the melting temperature of the coating.The temperature of the specimen is then kept constant for a specified dwell time.The result of the microstructural analysis shows that the modified EA rapid heating could effectively increase the thickness of the intermetallic layer between the coating and steel substrate much faster than conventional furnace heating and induction heating.The effectiveness of EA rapid heating may be due to the athermal effect of the electric current on the mobility of atoms,in addition to the well-known resistance heating effect.EA rapid heating also provides a technical advantage in that partial austenization can be easily achieved by properly placing the electrodes,as demonstrated in the present study.