Fracture toughness of medium-high carbon steel for railroad wheel

Railroad wheel brittle fracture is catastrophic, and can cause a derailment . Such usage conditions as load and speed of railroad vehicles have become severe in recent years. Therefore, more precise evaluation of wheel strengt h and safety has been desired. From recent development of fracture mechanic s, it is clear that in order to prevent the wheel fracture, fracture toughn ess of medium-high carbon steel for railroad wheels should be raised. This paper describes the effect of carbon, manganese, aluminum solution on the f racture toughness. Ferrite volume fraction and grain refinement were analys ed to obtain the relationship between fracture toughness and material chara cteristics in medium-high carbon steel. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.