3)White Cast Iron

The term cast iron refers to those iron carbon silicon alloys which contain 1.8 % – 4 carbon (C) and usually
0.5 % – 3 % silicon (Si). Cast iron is an important engineering material with a number of advantages,
mainly good castability and machinability and moderate mechanical properties.

White cast iron contains 1.8 % -3.6 % C, 0.5 % -1.9 % Si and 1 % – 2 % manganese (Mn). White cast irons
are so called because when broken, the fracture surface is white. This is unlike the grey fracture surface
normally associated with other cast irons which contain graphite.

White cast iron is a cast iron without any alloy addition and with low C and Si content such that the
structure is hard brittle iron carbide (Fe?C, also called cementite) with no free graphite. A fast cooling rate
prevents the precipitation of C as graphite. Instead the C, which is in solution in the melt, forms iron
carbide. The structure of white cast iron consists of pearlite and ledeburite, a eutectic mixture of pearlite
(converted from austenite) and cementite. Cementite is hard and brittle and dominates the microstructure of
white cast iron. Thus, white cast iron is hard and brittle and has a white crystalline fracture because it is
essentially free of graphite. Typical micro structure of white cast iron is shown in Fig 1.

Fig 1 Typical micro structure of white cast iron