What would be the toughest steel to use for rake tines?

[SoCal Dave]

I've been hardfacing the tines and comb for this arena rake.  I thought it might be easier to just use a tougher steel for the tines.  I am unable to get the type of steel from the manufacturer of the rake, John Deer.  It seems like a spring steel to me.  What could I use in place that is the toughest steel that is available?  

[jmccustomknives]

Most of your implements are going to be 1060/1070 class steel.  Run some stoody 33 or XHC on the ends that contact the soil for added wear resistance.

[njanvilman]

Be careful you do not loose the spring in the tines.  I tried welding and post heating some broken tines on a york rake, but everyone eventually failed.  Ended up just buying new ones.

[DSW]

AR type plate is usually used on buckets and so on for wear resistance. However I don't think it's available in rounds.

[SoCal Dave]

I have hardfaced the tines and comb with Stoody 35.  The problem for me is that the tines are wearing faster than I like and require constant hardfacing.  That is why I thought I needed a tougher resistant steel to abrasion for the tines.  

[BIGGUNDOCTOR]

Sounds like steady income to me.

I know on dozer blades they do a waffle pattern to trap dirt, so you have dirt to dirt rubbing. A solid surface allows dirt to rub off, while the waffle pockets trap it.

[SoCal Dave]

I have just run two passes on the bottom of the tines as that seems to be the only area that wears.  

 

[yahoo2]

If they are a quality tine they will be boron steel, its cheaper to wear them down and replace them with a new set than weld and re-heat treat them.

 

they are probably sold as 51B60 grade case hardened item.

[SoCal Dave]

I haven't heat treated them.  I only hardface the bottoms.  The tines go for about $400 for a set of twenty one tines.  The hardfacing rod cost $115 for a 10 lb box and I've hardfaced the comb twice and the tines once and still have half the box left.  I do the hardfacing on my own time as part of my contribution to the community.  However, the wearing of the tines has been greater and faster than I thought, and I'm trying to figure out if there is a better material to use that won't wear as fast. I would like to cut a few inches off and weld a stronger, tougher material back in place, but only if it is a lot tougher and will stand up to the abrasion.  So, my question is " what is the strongest/toughest steel I can use that will stand up to abrasion"??

[DSW]

That would probably be an AR ( abrasion resistant) type steel like AR 500 or AR 600. Problem is it only comes in sheets and I doubt that would really be suitable for what you want to do.

 

http://www.leecosteel.com/abrasion-resistant-steel-plate.html

 

 

The stuff is NOT cheap, and you'd probably have to have it water jetted or plasma cut. AR plate is typically heat treated, so you need to follow specific procedures for welding and cutting if you want to maintain it's toughness and wear resistance, especially with small pieces. If you don't it will often become brittle and break.

 

 

You might be able to work with tool steel round stock like D2 or M2 possibly, but I'm not sure how well they hold up to abrasion from dirt/sand.

[ThomasPowers]

 abrasion resistance and toughness are not on the same axis---diamond is very abrasion resistant; but not very tough.  I would think that farm equipment designed for working sandy soils would be your best bet; but a lot of stuff is "one size fits all" these days.

[yahoo2]

As soon as you hardface the bottoms the metal that is exposed to the heat of the weld becomes soft, dirt flowing around the sides will undercut the hardfacing in certain soils and when the weld is worn away the parent metal will will wear at a rate 10-15 times the rate of the original tine.

 

I have done most things that are possible with ground tools and run them for thousands of hectares, in dry soil the only thing that works cost effectively is metal spray hardfacing with tungsten carbide chips in the powder mix. I used to build tungsten plated knife points once but I can buy them for half the price now because everybody uses them and the price has dropped.

 

$19 seems cheap to me, if I had to do it I would just buy a length of spring steel, cut the end off the tines above where they are considered worn out and weld a new end on with some low hydrogen rods. Give the new ends a heat treatment with the forge or oxy. I would consider that a practical level of wear.

2 sets of tines helps manage your time, as they can be rotated out for repair and the machine can keep going.

[Frank Turley]

yahoo 2 reminded me of our horseshoe Borium, a  trade name, which we used to prevent excessive horseshoe wear. It is sold in 1/4" mild steel rods which contain multitudinous bits of tungsten carbide. We fed the rod as a filler rod for build-up with an oxy-acetylene torch tip.

[ianinsa]

I'm posting this as a ''thinking outside the box'' item, have you considered ''sleeving'' the tine? That is find a tube say galv water pipe that is inexpensive (think b grade) that you slip over the tine and becomes a consumable when it's worn brown an inch you take it off and add a 1'' spacer on top etc.

 

Ian

[SoCal Dave]

Frank and Ianinsa thanks:  I never thought of borium, but that brings up a question.  Which is better against abrasion-Borium vs hardfacing rod?  And the idea of using a sleeve also gave me some thought.  Maybe both would work together?  Thanks guys.  

[jmccustomknives]

The borium is tungsten carbides suspended in a low melting point carrier.  It is really designed to give the shoe extra bite.  I'm not sure exactly how much wear resistance it will give in your situation.

  I just double checked.  I think using the Stoody xhc will work will well.  It is much harder than the 35 which is designed for impact + wear so it has to give up some hardness.  Just keep the number of passes under 3.

[BM454]

I've welded AR 400 steel before and it's a pain. One could buy some heavy plate cut them out bigger and have them machined down to size. You're looking at some money there though. Why not build it up with 309 Stainless and hard surface over that? Stainless will probably hold up better than the carbon. One could at least try one or two until you found the best combination.

[Charles R. Stevens]

Don't forget to cover all 5 sides exposed to to wear, if you only cover the bottom, as pointed out the rest of the serface will wear and the hard facing will break off.
One might also consider converting to replaceable cultivator tines, you have the investment in building the attachment points, but they are relitivly inexpensive and with the time and money your already investing, it's probably a wash. Then replacement is relatively cheap and easy.
I'm not talking about the whole sprin tine, just the points bolted to an aproriatly shaped bar.
Another point to consider, unless your using a packer on your arena drag you shouldn't be going all that deep, as its hard on the horses joints, especially there hocks.

[ianinsa]

A further thought! If you use a ''sleeve system' you might consider sds breaker bits as inserts - cheap and tough.

 

Ian

[SoCal Dave]

Sorry, but what are sds breaker bits?  

[yahoo2]

Now you are really thinking outside the box Ian.

 

I got given a bucketful of worn out SDS MAX breaker bits and drill bits last year. they are a mixture of 18mm and 25mm shafts on them, they would be perfect for this sort of thing.

Never even thought of that! champion stuff :)

I bought a fencing crowbar the other day for $5 there is some tough steel in that one, I cant bend it! something like that could be chopped up and fitted on as well.

 

SDS is a standard locking mechanism to fit masonry tools into rotary hammer drills. SDS plus is what I use for drilling to install cables through stone walls with a 1500W hammer drill. SDS Max is electric jackhammer sized tools.

[SoCal Dave]

I was looking at the Stoody XHC rods on the internet.  How do they compare to the Stoody 35 rods?  The description of the 35 rods indicates it also is for abrasion situations.  

[arftist]

Things need to be worth a lot more than $19 to be worth hardfacing. They are quick change tines for a reason. It was already explained to you how hardfacing works, you seem to be ignoring both explanations, and what you are doing is just making them wear faster.

One more go; hardface is used to create pockets which hold sand so that the sand is wearing against the sand being dug, not the metal. You are welding very expensive hard metal onto much cheaper hard metal and making the cheap hard metal soft in the process. You are going backward fast.

You may find you could make the tines themselves cheaper than $19 if your labor is free, but even then, I doubt it. There is a cost to doing things, sometimes, especially with commercial farm equipment, the lowest cost method has long ago been figured out and some simple welding move with expensive rods isn't going to improve the economics of scale one iota.

[Charles R. Stevens]

Recycle the used tines, we're blacksmiths, thats what we do ;-)

[SoCal Dave]

My experience so far has been that hardfacing the tines with the Stoody 35 has worked well in preventing material loss of the tines, if a maintenance program is adhered to.  In theory, if I keep touching up the worn hardfacing areas, the tines and comb could last forever.  But, that is impossible, since I'm not the tractor guy dragging the arenas, and inspecting the rake after use.  There doesn't appear to me any way to create a pocket on the bottom of the tines or comb.