The purpose of the research was to examine the influence of boron on the selected properties of low-alloy cast steels. The chemical compositions of the cast steels were designed especially for this study to contain different alloy elements. The first composition lacked significant alloying elements. The subsequent grades of cast steels had the addition of chrome, chrome with vanadium, and chrome with titanium. It was decided to investigate the influence of boron in the presence of such alloying additives on the temperature of phase transformations. On the basis of dilatometric curves, the characteristic temperatures of the phase transformations were determined. Additionally, to assess the influence of the cooling rate on the structure of cast steels, an analysis of their microstructure, after full annealing and quenching, was carried out.

This work deals with the effect of austempering temperature and time on the microstructure and content of retained austenite of a selected cast steel assigned as a material used for frogs in railway crossovers. Bainitic cast steel was austempered at 400°C, 450°C and 500°C for two selected times (0.5 h, 4.0 h) to study the evolution of the microstructure and retained austenite content. The microstructure was characterized by optical microscopy, X-ray diffraction analyses (XRD), and hardness tests. Phase transformations during and after austempering were determined by dilatometric methods.

The increase in isothermal temperature causes an increase in time to start of bainitic transformation from 0.25 to 1.5 s. However, another increase in temperature to 500°C shifts the incubation time to as much as 11 s. The time after which the transformations have ended at individual temperatures is similar and equal to about 300 s (6 min.). The dilatation effects are directly related to the amount of bainite formation. Based on these we can conclude that the temperature effect in the case of cast steel is inversely proportional to the amount of bainite formed. The largest effect can be distinguished in the case of the sample austempered at 400°C and the smallest at 500°C. Summarizing the dilatometric results, we can conclude that an increase in austempering temperature causes an increase in austenite stability. In other words, the chemical composition lowers (shifts to lower temperatures) the range of bainite transformation. It is possible that at higher austempering temperatures we will receive only stable austenite without any transformation. This is indicated by the hatched area in Figure 4b. This means that the heat treatment of cast steel into bainite is limited on both sides by martensitic transformation and the range of stable austenite. The paper attempts to estimate the content of retained austenite with X-ray diffraction.

The present paper describe the issue of tool materials wear in a high temperature conditions. The investigations were performed at the cast steel tool material at the tribological contact to the structural steel. The investigations aim was to determine the role of microstructure in a tribological properties between the structural steel and tool material. The results of such investigation could be referenced to the industry conditions and could answer about the problems of tool materials wear. The observations of the wear mechanisms were referred to the microstructure of the mill rolls. The laboratory tests ware aimed at evaluating the thermal treatment modification effect on the cast steels properties. A significant role of the morphology of ledeburitic cementite and secondary cementite on the tribological properties was exhibited. The investigations assumed the presence of an austenitic matrix with primary and secondary cementite. Influence of varying morphology carbides was described. in the cast steel microstructure. The investigation results make possible to point to a direction of carbide morphology change with the purpose of obtaining the assumed properties of hot operation tools.