Wear properties of two U71Mn K and U71Mn G rail steel welds during rolling contact fatigue

Wear behaviors of two U71Mn K and U71Mn G rail steels have been systematically investigated with the simulated experiments during the tolling contact fatigue using samples taken from their base materials, the heat-affected zones near the weld, and the weld zones, respectively. The results demonstrate that there are significant differences between the nonweld and the weld zones for both steels. With higher hardness of U71Mn G over U71Mn K, the U71Mn G steel has mild abrasion damage, reduced weight loss from wear and reduced corrugations of the weld zone during the experiment with increased simulative speed; while its other features such as the plastic deformation and cracks are almost the same compared with the U71Mn K steel. The U71Mn G steel demonstrates superior performance over U71Mn K at the high-speed rolling experiment.