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I Forge Iron

Who has used 1144?


Harris Snyder

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Hello everyone,

 

I'm curious about 1144 steel and it's forging properties. I'm about to pick some up for a machining project, and I'm trying to decide how much to get. It has .40 to .48% carbon, (and over a percent manganese), so I reason that it should be hardenable and behave similarly to 1045. However, 1144 has a bit of sulfur added (up to .33%) to make it easier to machine. Does this interfere with it's forging properties at all, or affect its properties if forged into a tool like a drift or fuller? Can I just treat this like 1045 and call it a day, or is this just wishful thinking?

Thanks.

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Googling "forging properties of 1144 steel" isn't yielding any hits on forging it but I'm not going to spend much time reading through search hits you should be reading through.

 

This is one of many hits about the properties of 1144 Stressproof steel and my experience with Stressproof and other high mang steels would have me using it for something else. It's formulated as a "Free machining steel with poor welding and oven or torch hardening properties" which fits my experience. http://amsresources.com/1141-1144-1145-resulfurized-carbon-steel/

 

Frosty The Lucky.

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Sulfur was a big problem in early steels as it causes it to crumble when heated and forged---hot short; the "fix" was adding Mn so I can't guess what a "high sulfur high Mn" alloy would end up like; but I would suspect you wouldn't be happy with it as a forging alloy as it's been tweaked for machining.

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Seems to me Nathan Robertson mentioned to me several years ago he was using 1144 for hammers at the time because I was able to get a good deal on it local to him.  I could be wrong but I am pretty sure that was  the steel.  He didn't mention any problems with forging it.

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1144 is a proprietary product from LaSalle which is intended to be machined in the supplied condition with no further heat treatment needed. The qualities are achieved by heavy coldworking so there probably isn't a lot of forging and H/T info available. We run a lot of it where I work because we can drop a finished part (prior to zinc plating for corrosion resistance). I doubt it will act like 1045 or 4140 but you can certainly experiment.

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Alright, so there goes that idea, by and large. I'll buy a little less 1144 for machining, and pick up some 4140 or 1045.

 

There is a bit of disagreement on the issue, it seems that some people have used it successfully, but since it really isn't that big a deal to just get a few rods of each, I'll just do that.

Thanks.

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If I remember right - 1144 is the steel Ive used for the hand hammers Ive made and used a water quench then temper at straw - I still use all the ones Ive made and no issues with them at all. (7 of them ranging from 2.25 to 6.3 lbs)

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1144 was designed to replace applications where parts are machined and subsequently heat treated in the range of 25-32 Rc (i.e., the material is "pre-hardened") - so it provides a cost savings for certain uses. Can it be forged and heat treated to use as a hammer head - maybe - but it is an experiment. I would not discount anyone's experience but you should realize it may not be the best choice. Go for it - nothing ventured, nothing gained...

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Steve, if I'm reading you correctly you are commenting on RR spike knife makers rather than the discussion in this thread?    If you are discussing 1144 then call me a parrot because about 5 years ago I took a class with Nathan Robertson on hammer making.  It's what he used in the class, for the reasons explained above.  Around 3/4 of the people taking the class were what I would consider "Master" or really darn good blacksmiths.  Full time pros.  The rest were serious hobbyists. Everyone in the class was quite impressed with the hammers we produced, and the one I made has become my favorite seeing almost daily use for the subsequent years.  I have made 4 more hammers of varying designs but using the same steel and heat treating since then and all have been great.  

 

It is indeed NOT a blade steel.  But a hammer is not a blade!  A nickname for 1144 is "stressproof" and my understanding is that it is slow to work harden, an admirable quality in a hammer.  I haven't poked a Rockwell tester into any of my 1144 hammers but I can state that they are slightly softer than my high quality anvil (anvil is mid to high Rc 50s) and noticeably harder than hardened and drawn to purple alloy steel punches and drifts.  

 

Not the BEST steel for a hammer, but far from the worst.  Perfectly adequate for the performance expectations and really easy to heat treat.  

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maybe I should have included the quote form Thomas,  I was talking about rr spike comments vs real blade steels, I even said so in my post.   In general however many of us tend to repeat what we heard, rather than try it for ourselves, which was the target about my use of the parrot  analogy

 

I see no problem with using 1144 for hammers.  Personally I feel that  the increased levels of Mn, as well as the carbon range being near the low end of hardenability, makes it a great choice for that  job.

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Judson that was the kind of information I at least wanted: experience---knows what you should expect from a hammer; time under test---not a used it for an hour and liked it.

The spike comment is that we see a lot of folks posting that they make a good knife; but they tend to be not an experienced blade user and don't usually have a long period of use to remark on. For me 1 post by someone with expertise outweighs 1000 posts by someone who does not have expertise on the subject. The internet tends to favour the latter however.

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Alright, so there goes that idea, by and large. I'll buy a little less 1144 for machining, and pick up some 4140 or 1045.

 

There is a bit of disagreement on the issue, it seems that some people have used it successfully, but since it really isn't that big a deal to just get a few rods of each, I'll just do that.

Thanks.

 

1045 and 4140 are worlds apart themselves,

 http://www.interlloy.com.au/our-products/carbon-steels/1045-medium-tensile-carbon-steel-bar/

http://www.interlloy.com.au/our-products/high-tensile-steels/4140-high-tensile-steel/?output=pdf

not to be confused with each other, in forging, heat treating or tensile strength.

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1144 is not proprietary, at least not the version being discussed here. It is a plain carbon, resulfurized steel. It will forge and heat treat pretty much like 1045. We forge a lot of this and similar resulphurized steels at work. The one big difference is that is it much easier to develop centerline tearing in grade than in 1045. Probably not a big issue unless you plan to make a lot of small round cross sections like tenons. Even though this does have sulfur added back to it, it is not usually considered red short in the same way steels of old were when they had high sulfur. The high manganese combines with the sulfur and prevent the formation of iron sulfide which would make the steel red short.

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Stressproof is a trade name which encompasses more than composition. It is cold worked a certain amount and stress releived. If you intend to forge the material then you are really only concerned with the comosition and how it will respond to further heat treatment. If you are going straight into a machinining operation and want the dimensional uniformity and machiniability of a cold worked resulfurized grade than this could be and excellent starting material.

 

Patrick

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  • 6 years later...

Old threads like this are awesome.  Found just what I needed.  I'm making a vise handle for a float lock vise, and I would prefer to forge a ball on the end of the handle for the main vise.  That being said I have 1018, 1144, and 304 stainless in just the right size for the application.  I knew 1144 was the strongest of the three, but I didn't know about its forgeability.  I also have 1045, and 4140 on hand, but none in a size that would not require me to turn them down first.  Now I'm pretty sure I can lop off a piece of 1144 and ball the ends with little issue.  Thanks for this old post guys.  I was concerned because of 1144s reputation for not being generally weldable as to how well it would forge.  

P.S.  Stressproof and Fautigeproof are tradenames.  I believe they are registered trademarks.  There may be some difference in the two as they are marketed differently.  1144 is a composition with a range of ingredients.  

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