Some of the wear-resistant pieces or coatings, constituted of a metallic matrix and of carbides present in high fractions, are a mix, in similar quantities, of two materials displaying greatly different levels of hardness but also of thermal expansion coefficient. When temperature increases, the second difference of property may lead to particular geometrical behaviours. To study these differences, nine nickel-based, cobalt-based, and iron-based alloys containing very high quantities of carbides were elaborated by foundry. In their as-cast conditions, the microstructures of these alloys were characterized; their hardness and thermal expansion until 1200°C were measured and analysed, with regard to the evolution of the structures predicted by thermodynamic calculations. The hardness of the alloys is high (nickel alloys) or very high (cobalt and iron alloys, 600 Hv and more) while the thermal expansion is greatly influenced by carbides, notably when temperature has become very high. Some of the variations of thickness at the end of heating or during an isothermal stage at 1200°C, essentially contraction, directly result from the mechanical interaction between matrix and carbides which was accumulated during the heating.
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