Gears require BÖHLER steels with high fatigue strength, wear resistance, and surface hardness. Key quality features include ultra-clean materials, controlled heat treatment, full traceability, and rigorous testing for reliable automotive and racing performance.
Gears used in automotive and high-performance racing applications operate under extreme mechanical stresses, including high contact pressures, cyclic loading, and varying thermal conditions. Reliable torque transmission and efficiency require materials with outstanding fatigue strength, wear resistance, and surface durability. Material requirements therefore focus on high hardness at the tooth flank, a tough core to withstand dynamic loads, and resistance to pitting, scuffing, and micro-cracking. In racing environments, additional demands such as weight optimization and thermal stability are critical for peak performance and reliability.
BÖHLER high-performance steels and alloys are specifically engineered to meet these demanding gear requirements. Advanced case-hardening steels, nitriding steels, and high-strength alloyed grades provide an optimal combination of surface hardness and core toughness. Produced using advanced melting and refining technologies, BÖHLER materials ensure superior cleanliness, low inclusion content, and a homogeneous microstructure, significantly enhancing fatigue life and load capacity. Key quality features include precise chemical composition control, certified traceability, and tightly controlled heat treatment processes to achieve consistent case depth and hardness profiles. Surface engineering solutions further improve wear resistance. Comprehensive testing, including fatigue, hardness, and non-destructive inspection, ensures reliable and repeatable gear performance. BÖHLER materials enable efficient, durable, and high-performance gear solutions for automotive and racing applications.
BÖHLER W360 ISOBLOC is a material produced by the electroslag remelting process (ESR), which has been specially adapted for use at high tool hardnesses in the range of 51-57 HRC. Although the steel can be classified as a 5% chromium steel, the increased carbon and molybdenum content coupled with state-of-the-art manufacturing technology ensures that BÖHLER W360 ISOBLOC still shows a very good toughness and an exceptionally good thermal resistance, even at high hardness levels. These properties make the steel the perfect choice for smaller components in the die casting sector (e.g., mold inserts, cores, core pins, ejector pins, etc.). The material also is frequently the preferred choice for closed-die and open-die forging tools due to its high wear resistance. Because of this excellent wear resistance and the high toughness, BÖHLER W360 ISOBLOC is also frequently used for cold work applications and as a molding material for plastic injection molds. The Steel also is available as powder material for metal-3D-printing under the brand name BÖHLER W360 AMPO.
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