Vol.

38, No. 1 (2016) 1-10

Tribology in Industry

www.tribology.fink.rs

Tribological Aspects of Cast Iron Investigated Via
Fracture Toughness


C. Fragassa a, G. Minak a, A. Pavlovic a

a Department of Industrial Engineering, Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna, Italy.

Keywords: A B S T R A C T
Compacted Graphite Iron (CGI)
Linear-elastic plane-strain fracture toughness of metallic materials is a
Spheroidal Graphite (SGI)
method which covers the determination of the strain fracture toughness
Experimental analysis
(KIC) of metallic materials by increasing-force test of fatigue precracked

specimens. This method has been applied for investigating the fracture
Corresponding author: behaviour of cast iron. Two groups of cast alloys, Compacted Graphite Iron
Cristiano Fragassa (CGI) and Spheroidal Graphite Iron (SGI) have been investigated. While
University of Bologna, SGI benefits of a wide scientific literature, CGI is a relatively unknown
viale Risorgimento 2, Bologna, Italy material despite of its large potentialities in industrial applications.
E-mail: cristiano.fragassa@unibo.it 6 Published by Faculty of Engineering

1. INTRODUCTION Actually, the only cast irons with significant
commercial uses are the grey and the ductile
Cast iron is a group of iron-carbon alloys with ones. In fact, most of the production of white
carbon content greater than 2 % [1]. The alloy cast iron is intended for a further reprocessing
constituents affect its colour when fractured. aimed at obtaining malleable or ductile cast
But, more relevantly, these constituents affect irons. At the same time, the malleable cast iron is
microstructure and final proprieties of the alloy. declining very fast since its processing presents
According to the microstructure (Fig. 1), the a higher complexity, not justified by lower
following families of cast alloy are improvements in the mechanical proprieties.
conventionally identified [2]:
white cast iron Comparing grey and ductile cast irons, even if
the grey is largely used nowadays, it is manly
grey cast iron
malleable cast iron the lowest cost appears one of the main
advantages driving this material selection. On
ductile cast iron.
the contrary, ductile cast iron uses to represent
choice wherever superior
mechanical characteristics are requested.
Several interesting dissertations are available
with the aim at comparing the proprieties [3-5]
or in specific the fields of applicability [6,7] of

Fig. 1. Example of microstructures. these different cast alloys.