Material, Design, and Application Counseling

An Information by ZGV - Castings Application Centre

Our member foundries offer a wide range of casting materials featuring different property combinations. Alloying technologies enable our member foundries to supply casting materials that conform precisely to the technical and economic requirements of the moment.

The advantages of using castings are enhanced by the proper selection of raw materials.

Casting offers the shortest possible transition from the liquid raw material to the finished product while allowing maximum freedom of component design.

Grey-iron castings (lamellar-graphite castings): An outstanding structural material that offers good in-service performance and varied applications. Particularly suitable for richly contoured, complex, and thin-walled components. Unusual pressure resistance, good damping, wear resistance, and good corrosion resistance.
Spherolitic-iron castings: A ductile material of high strength that is eminently suitable for lightweight construction, offering good dynamic-load resistance and surface-hardening properties. Suitable for components exposed to unusual wear.
Malleable castings: A ductile material characterized by high tensile and breaking strength, impact or shock-bending resistance, and plastic deformability, which is particularly well adapted to thin-walled components exposed to impact shock. Well suited to the making of thin-walled castings of complex design and highly precise configuration.
Moreover, white malleable castings are weldable, permitting the design of welded components.
Steel castings: A highly varied material (around 150 standardized varieties). Its outstanding properties include weldability, toughness, strength, low-temperature resistance, and good resistance to heat, scaling, corrosion, and wear.

Developments in the German foundry industry are characterized by continuous improvements in material and manufacturing engineering.