ABRASIVE WEAR STUDY OF SELECTED WHITE CAST IRONS AS LINER MATERIALS FOR THE MINING-INDUSTRY

The abrasive wear behaviour of three white cast irons, designated as 1 0Cr-3.5Ni, 15Cr-3Mo and 16.5Cr-1.5Mo irons (where the compositions are in weight per cent), was studied in a field test as liners installed in a transfer of an iron ore operation and in three laboratory wear te sts (pin-on-drum, dry-sand-rubber-wheel (DSRW) and paddle testers) to determine the relevance of the laboratory wear tests to the field line r test. The results from the wear tests and wear mechanism study showe d that under the test conditions the DSRW test most closely predicts t he relative wear rate of the white irons in the field liner test. Howe ver, a perfect match of both the wear mechanism and the rank of the we ar rate for the iron from the laboratory wear test to the field liner test was not achieved, owing to the complexity of the field liner wear condition. The wear mechanisms were elucidated by microscopic examina tion of the worn surfaces for both field-tested liners and laboratory- tested specimens, and by subsurface examination of paddle-tested speci mens, together with the microstructural study of the irons. The predom inant wear mechanisms depend upon both the wear conditions and the mic rostructural properties of the irons. It was found that the wear resis tance of the White irons for the low stress abrasion is controlled by the matrix, and that for the high stress abrasion and impact abrasion is main determined by the bulk hardness of the irons.