Castability Difference Bewteen Cast Iron and Steel

There're lots of iron castings and steel castings made in our foundry. Due to the good castablity of cast iron, castt iron is widely chosen to cast components for various industries. Then, why castability of cast iron is better than steel? 

First, chemical components of cast iron is much simple. 

The mainly element of cast iron is Fe. Besides Fe, there're only little impurities, such as, carbon(C), silicon(Si), phosphorus(P). But steel, especially the alloy steel contains lots of elements. Besides C, Si, Mn, S,P, the steel contains elments of chrome(Cr), nickel(Ni), manganese(Mn), etc. With the simple elements structure, crystallization temperature of cast iron is much stable than steel.  

Second, the liquidity of cast iron is much better than steel

During casting, the chemical components will be melt almost same time and solidification at same time. Different alloy elements in steel castings are with different melting point and solidification point. This will hinder the melting and casting process. In this view, the liquidity of cast iron is much better than steel.

Third, the shrinkage of iron casting is stable after casting and cooling. 

Chemical structure of cast iron changed little after casting and cooling. But steel castings are with bigger shrinkage between elements. This results in bigger deformation during steel casting. Thus, deformation of iron castings are smaller than steel castings.

Due to the above characteristics, cast iron is widely used in casting industry. If you have RFQs for iron castings, please contact us. We can make iron castings in both sand casting and investment casting.