The fracture behaviour of welded joints pearlitic and bainitic rail steel

The contribution is focused on analysis of welded joint made from pearlitic rail steel of type UIC 900A and newly developed cast bainitic Lo8CrNiMo steel. The lowest dynamic fracture toughness and consequently the higher risk of brittle fracture possessed the pearlitic steel and its heat affected zone (HAZ). At application temperature range the fracture toughness of this steel was on lower shelf of ductile to brittle transition, the tempering in HAZ didn't affect the toughness substantially. The dynamic fracture toughness of cast bainitic steel in joint was two times highest comparing to pearlitic one and, in addition HAZ toughness increase was found. The weld joint itself was characterised by high scatter of toughness data, nevertheless, all the values were above the scatter band characterising the more brittle pearlitic steel