Steel castings: special features.
While simple cast iron grades can be cast from around 1140°, steel must be heated to around 1600°. The higher temperatures in turn require more complex melting technology, from template manufacture to melting furnaces and finishing. Compared with iron castings, the finished castings are more brittle and often require heat treatment. High-alloy steel castings (e.g., extremely heat-resistant materials) are mainly quenched and tempered with chromium, nickel, molybdenum, vanadium, or tungsten. This results in high heat resistance combined with low wear. Another characteristic of cast steel is its shrinkage of 2%, which is twice as high as that of other cast iron grades. In our foundry, we use two production methods in mold making: lost wax and croning.