What steel is this??

[ausfire]

I have a couple of questions about old steel found on farm machinery. Apologies if this sounds simplistic, but I have a lot to learn about different steels.
I am fortunate in that I have any amount of steel from old machinery available to me. I took a piece of 3/8 “ control rod from an old plough to forge a few hooks, but as soon as I went to draw it to a taper, the end split into fibres and the whole thing resembled a worn toothbrush. What sort of steel (iron?) is this and is it totally useless?? Or was I useless in drawing it out? I used the same technique as with ordinary mild steel.
In the second photo there is a large horse-drawn stick rake and its curved hoops appear to be 5/8 inch spring steel. I want to make an oval shaped eye punch for ram’s heads and I thought I should try that steel. I know it's hard to say from a photo, but is it likely to be suitable for punch making??

[ken leedy]

The first material sounds like wrought iron. You need to work it much hotter that mild steel. Don't hammer it when it gets into the red colors. The large curved teeth are probably HC steel. They should make decent tools with proper heat treating.

[VaughnT]

Definitely sounds like your frayed piece was wrought iron.   That stuff needs to be worked at a yellow/white heat for big movements, and only use the orange/red zone for planishing blows that touch up the finish.  It's great for making a lot of stuff, especially if you want that wood-grain look.  Also relatively easy to forge weld together.

 

In general, the working bits on old farm equipment will be higher carbon content.  I would treat them like 10XX series steel and not think twice about it.  Rake tines make usually make a good knife or flint striker, punches and chisels, etc.  No need to heat treat anything that's going to be used on hot iron as the heat will just remove the temper anyway.

 

I would dearly love to have a pile of scrap like yours!   :D

[ThomasPowers]

Note too that on old farm machinery the repair pieces may have been made from anything handy and so two pieces side by side on the same bit of machinery may NOT be even close to each other in alloy!  (I've seen HC when mild would have been better and WI for almost any part even ones where HC would have been better, etc.)

[ausfire]

Thank you for the advice. I think I may have been a bit too aggresive with only red heat. I will have another go with more heat, and I'll try a piece of tyne for a punch.
And yes, I am indeed fortunate to have acres of this stuff to play with.