**6. References**


the production cost.

**Author details** 

**Acknowledgement** 

Marcin Madej

*11.11.110.788.*

**6. References** 

112-114.

55 – 66.

2. Direct infiltration of green compacts with copper results in the higher hardness and higher resistance to wear of the M3/2 and M3/2+30 %WC composites, and allows to cut

3. The mechanical properties of the HSS based composites are strongly dependent on the tungsten carbide content. The additions of tungsten carbide increase the hardness of

4. Tungsten-rich M6C type carbide is formed as a result of the chemical reaction between

5. The carbides seen on the wear-surfaces of as infiltrated composites are being crushed

*This work was financed by Ministry of Science and Higher Education through the project No* 

[1] Greetham G.: Development and performance on infiltrated and non-infiltrated valve seat insert materials and their performance. Powder Metallurgy, 1990, vol 3, no 2, pp.

[2] Rodrigo H. Plama: Tempering response of copper alloy-infiltrated T15 high-speed steel,

[3] Wright C.S.: The production and application of PM high-speed steels. Powder

[4] Torralba J.M. G. Cambronero, J. M. Ruiz-Pietro, M. M das Neves: Sinterability study of PM M2 and T15 HSS reinforced with tungsten and titanium carbides, 1993, vol 36, pp.

[5] M. Madej, J. Leżański: Copper infiltrated high speed steel based composites, Archives

[6] M. Madej, J. Leżański: The structure and properties of copper infiltrated HSS based,

[7] M. Madej: The tribological properties of high speed steel based composites, Archives of

of Metallurgy and Materials, 2005 vol. 50 iss. 4 s. 871–877.

Metallurgy and Materials 2010 vol. 55 iss. 1 s. 61–68

Archives of Metallurgy and Materials, 2008, vol. 53, iss. 3 s. 839–845.

The International Journal of Powder Metallurgy, 2001, Vol. 37, No 5, s. 29-35.

HSS based composites, but decrease their bending strength.

and pulled out of the matrix to act as abrasive particles.

*Faculty of Metal Engineering and Industrial Computer Science, Krakow, Poland* 

the tungsten monocarbide and HSS matrix

*AGH University of Science and Technology,* 

Metallurgy 1994 vol 3, pp. 937-944.

	- [23] M. M. Oliveira: *High-speed steels and high-speed steels based composites*. International Journal of Materials and Product Technology, 2000, Vol. 15, No 35, s. 231-251.

**Chapter 4** 

© 2012 Pędzich, licensee InTech. This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use,

© 2012 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution,

distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**Tungsten Carbide as an Reinforcement in** 

The possibility of serious improvement of mechanical properties of oxide ceramics by particulate composites manufacturing has been recently recognized very well. Among oxide ceramics, tetragonal zirconia solid solutions and α-alumina phase are the most important materials, widely used in structural applications, due to their good properties. The fabrication of two-phase particulate composites could be the simplest way to the mechanical properties improvement. Despite a wide range of alumina-zirconia composites, non-oxide particles were also often utilized as strengthening agents. Many phases were introduced into zirconia and alumina matrices – TiC, SiC, WC, TiB2, TiN, AlN, (Ti,W)C, Cr2O3, Cr7C3, and metals – nickel, molybdenum and tungsten and others [1-17]. In this way, the materials with improved properties, when compared with "pure" matrix materials, were obtained. Depending on the type of inclusions, their size and amount as well as sintering conditions, one can achieve a significant improvement of hardness, stiffness, fracture toughness and/or strength of the material. It was also reported that the decrease of inclusion size to the nanometric scale allowed extremely high values of flexural strength and fracture toughness

The manufacturing of composites with ceramic matrix almost always leads to residual stresses caused by the mismatch of thermal properties of constituent phases. A large difference in thermal expansion coefficients (CTE's) could introduce stresses reaching even more than gigaPascals to the composite system. Such a phenomenon has to influence the way of fracture and consequently the strength and the fracture toughness of the material. The value of these stresses mainly depends on mechanical properties of constituent phases of the composite and the absolute difference between their CTE's. The distribution of residual stresses depends also on the phase arrangement and shape of grains. This chapter presents the investigation results on the influence of the phase arrangement on the way of

**Structural Oxide-Matrix Composites** 

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

Zbigniew Pędzich

**1. Introduction** 

to be achieved.

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/51183

**Chapter 4** 
