Metal casting is an important manufacturing technology for efficiently producing massive components with complex shape. A large share of industrial castings is made from iron and steel alloys, combining attractive properties and low production cost. Upgrading of properties in cast iron and steel is mainly achieved by alloying and in fewer cases by heat treatment. Molybdenum is an important alloying element in that respect, increasing strength, hardness and toughness. It also facilitates particular heat treatments such as austempering. The paper describes the metallurgical functionality of molybdenum alloying in iron-based castings and demonstrates its effectiveness for applications in the automotive and mining industry.

It is high of commercial importance to generate the grain refinement in alloys during solidification by means of electromagnetic fields. Two typical patterns of electromagnetic fields, pulsed electric currents (ECP) and traveling magnetic field (TMF), are frequently employed to produce the finer equiaxed grains in solidifying alloys. Various mechanisms were proposed to understand the grain refinement in alloys caused by ECP and TMF. In this paper, a comparative study is carried out in the same solidification regime to investigate the grain refinement of Al-7 wt. %Si alloy driven by ECP and TMF. Experimental results show that the application of ECP or TMF can cause the same grain refinement occurrence period, during which the refinement of primary Al continuously occurs. In addition, the related grain refinement mechanisms are reviewed and discussed, which shows the most likely one caused by ECP and TMF is the promoted dendrite fragmentation as the result of the ECP-induced or TMF-induced forced flow. It suggests that the same grain refinement process in alloys is provoked when ECP and TMF are applied in the same solidification regime, respectively.

A NbTiHfZr high-entropy alloy (HEA) with a main phase of body-centered cubic structure is fabricated. Some hexagonal closed-packed (hcp) precipitates are observed in this alloy. A thermal-mechanical process, i.e., cold-rolling followed by annealing, can manipulate the volume fraction of the hcp nano-precipitates that can enhance strength and ductility. The enhancement is tailorable as a function of the volume fraction of the hcp nano-precipitate. The results indicate that the strength-ductility property can be manipulated via adjusting post-deformation heat-treatment methods, which provide a new strategy by utilizing metastability at high-temperature to design high strength refractory HEAs (RHEAs) without lost in ductility.

Investigating the separation of the primary silicon phase in Al-Si hypereutectic alloys is of high importance for the production of solar grade silicon. The present paper focuses on the effect of growth velocity on the electric current pulse (ECP)-induced separation of primary silicon in a directionally solidified Al-20.5 wt % Si hypereutectic alloy. Experimental results show that lower growth velocity promotes the enrichment tendency of primary silicon at the bottom region of the sample. The maximum measured area percentage of segregated primary silicon in the sample solidified at the growth velocity of 4 μm/s is as high as 82.6%, whereas the corresponding value is only 59% in the sample solidified at the growth velocity of 24 μm/s. This is attributed to the fact that the stronger forced flow is generated to promote the precipitation of primary silicon accompanied by a higher concentration of electric current in the mushy zone under the application of a slower growth velocity.

The effects of cryogenic temperature on the toughness of a Zr-based metallic glass are investigated. Based on three-dimensional fracture morphologies at different temperatures, the crack formation and propagation are analyzed. Through the calculation of the shear transformation zone volume, the shear modulus and bulk modulus of the metallic glass at different temperatures and the crack formation mechanism associated with the temperature is discussed. Once the crack commences propagation, the hyperelasticity model is used to elucidate the fractographic evolution of crack propagation.

The investigation of a columnar to equiaxed transition (CET) and grain refinement is of high commercial importance for the improvement of the solidification structure of metal castings. The crystal rain from the free surface is frequently generated to produce grain refinement and promote a CET in alloys under the application of electromagnetic fields. However, the mechanism underlying the CET influenced by the generated crystal rain is not clear because the employed metallic alloys are opaque. In the present paper, the crystal rain in a transparent NH₄Cl–H₂O solution is produced by blowing a cooled nitrogen gas on the free surface to observe in situ its impact on the occurrence of a CET. The results show that the crystal rain can significantly promote a CET even in a high temperature gradient and that a CET only can occur when the temperature gradient is almost close to zero in the reference experiment. Finally, the most likely mechanism is discussed and clarified.