Michael Cochran Posted September 24, 2016 Share Posted September 24, 2016 So as many of you know I have found a steel source at work, broken and/or worn out chain link weaving blades. As I mentioned before I contacted the manufacturer and they were not very willing or able to help since the alloy is 'proprietary information.' He did tell me it's a 'very high carbon' steel and when asked about chromium he said it didn't have any. Unfortunately that's all the information I coul get but it was a start. Knowing it's a tool steel both from my own spark test (picture below) and his admission I went to the forge to see what happens to the steel when it's under the hammer and to see how to harden it. I learned a couple things, it doesn't want to forge weld to itself, it is very slow to move when the color drops below what I'd call a low orange and stops moving very shortly after that. I also know it is not air hardening and wasn't able to test in oil since I seem to have lost my oil supply so I skipped to water and it got hard. The file I used skated across it nicely and it broke in relatively clean breaks when I tried breaking it. I have not tried tempering it yet but thought I'd share what little I know and see what thoughts some here might have on the subject. I would also like to say that if someone has a sample steel library and would like or be willing to test a piece please let me know and I'll send you a sample. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CMS3900 Posted September 24, 2016 Share Posted September 24, 2016 Call around to major scrap yards in your area and find one that has a metallurgical testing gun, or XRF gun, and how much they would charge to ping it for you. Most major scrap yards have them for positive metal identification. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted September 24, 2016 Author Share Posted September 24, 2016 I did not think about that. I'll have to Wait until Monday at the earliest because the closest one that has one is going to be closed in ten minute and it's a 30 minutes drive. Than you for reminding me about that XRF gun. I had completely forgotten about those things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted October 1, 2016 Author Share Posted October 1, 2016 So I made it to the local scrap yard with the X-ray gun and the guy I asked was more than willing to be helpful. First he sparked it and said 'yep it's high carbon' and then told me that the gun takes time to warm up but he would test it if I was willing to wait. He tested one piece twice and I took a picture of the screen both times. If anyone has a clue about the alloy please feel free to tell me. I'm doing some looking but don't expect to find an answer soon since I don't know of any way to search for an alloy by it's makeup. He said 'LEC' is aluminum and the 'Sn' for those that don't remember is tin the rest we should all know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 3, 2016 Share Posted October 3, 2016 My Google Fu revealed a course load's worth of lectures on Super alloys and LEC is I believe from only listening for a bit while I scanned lecture titles a lattice structure in high alloys. LEC was listed in all sorts of lectures on different alloys, some for HOT work, some extremely wear resistant and on. I stopped listening the lecturer spoke with a heavy accent and I'm bushed. Anyway, I'll be very interested in what you can do with the stuff. I was given some paddles from a scrap handling machine I can't get hot enough in my forge to ding the stuff at all, marred my hammer but the Soderfors was unmarked. I have zero idea what I'm going to use the stuff for but I have some. Frosty The Lucky. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted October 3, 2016 Author Share Posted October 3, 2016 I took the time this weekend to play with it some and things don't look too promising for me right now. I hammered out a small knife for the sake of trying heat treatment and things didn't go too well. After tempering at about 420F (as high as my little toaster oven would go) it was still brittle. I tried to see what kind of flex it would show and snapped off the tip. I clapped it down in the vise and every time I pulled it would break. It wasn't easy to break but it was breaking. If there was any flex at all I couldn't tell it since I was pulling hard and then suddenly all resistance was gone as it broke off. That said I'm guessing it needs a much higher temper so now I'm on the look out for something small enough for my shop (144 sq ft right now) but big enough to do the trick and cheap enough to not kill my wallet. Im also thinking about trying oil since I haven't actually tried hardening in oil. I'm wondering if it would still harden enough to be useable but not to the point I couldn't temper it enough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 3, 2016 Share Posted October 3, 2016 Heat treatment of some of the new super alloys isn't just heat, quench and temper to x temp. Some get their strength from how the molecules are positioned, literally molecular architecture. I believe just recently someone posted a link about a ferrous titanium super alloy the making of which was so far out of a home shop's reach so as to make it a conversation piece. Anywho, have you tried forge welding it into a billet and drawing it down till they mystery alloy component is really thin? It might make an acceptable super hard component if thin enough to flex without breaking with the softer steel as backer. Frosty The Lucky. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted October 3, 2016 Author Share Posted October 3, 2016 2 hours ago, Frosty said: Anywho, have you tried forge welding it into a billet and drawing it down till they mystery alloy component is really thin? It might make an acceptable super hard component if thin enough to flex without breaking with the softer steel as backer. Frosty The Lucky. I haven't tried that yet, that is a suggestion I'll have to investigate. I have thought about welding it with something else to see what kind of pattern I could get but haven't thought about there being a practical reason for it. Unfortunately right now I'm out of good known alloys so I might just make a go with some of the 3/16" flat A36 I have lying around. You did mean something like a San Mai type construction, right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kozzy Posted October 3, 2016 Share Posted October 3, 2016 Chain link weaving blades? I assume these are the paddles that turn in the forming dies for fence making. I'd be surprised if they were all that exotic. We usually use 01 tool steel for making ours. We're a bit of an oddball, though because it's easier to make our own than fiddle with someone else's. Just curious how you ended up with these as they're not all that common an item...and checking your constituent lists a little deeper to see if it might be of some benefit to our operation. We don't make fence but a similar product so are not competing with your source. The largest maker of weaving machines is Wafios in Italy so the mix might be something you see more of in Europe than the USA (assuming they buy the blades rather than make their own). Seems similar to an 06 tool steel as well as overlapping a couple of others http://www.alro.com/datacatalog/014-toolsteel.pdf (included because it mentions forging temps for all of them) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted October 4, 2016 Author Share Posted October 4, 2016 Yes, Kozzy, those are the ones. The ones I'm talking about are a very common item at work. They have 50+ new ones on hand at any given time and have a range of sizes from little ones for 3/8" mesh to huge ones for 3x5" mesh. Some how some of the guys manage to break one on occasion and they get thrown away as well as the ones that just get wore out from miles of wire being run across it. As far as the manufacturer goes, the two machines that were bought are Berghandi and I'm thinking that's where they get the rest of their parts since I've looked through the catalog full of notes for those who can't remember what to reorder. I have my moments where I'm a little bit 'simple' and right now I have to admit I am. What are you referring to when you mention my 'constituent lists'? I appreciate the link and the info. I'll head over and read up on the link and do some more reading on the O series steels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aessinus Posted October 4, 2016 Share Posted October 4, 2016 Kozzy, thanks for the link. Bookmarked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kozzy Posted October 4, 2016 Share Posted October 4, 2016 17 hours ago, Michael Cochran said: ... the two machines that were bought are Berghandi and I'm thinking that's where they get the rest of their parts since I've looked through the catalog full of notes for those who can't remember what to reorder. Back in the stone age I was contacted by a recruiter from Berghandi and had a long conversation with the owner. At that time he had just purchased property in Mexico to move some production and was working with companies in China to develop some other stuff. The direction they were talking to me about never happened but the moves mentioned imply that you might be talking about metals which are a little more loose in secondary goodies than one might find from some steel mills--at least we find that to be true on materials we buy. Nothing wrong, but when the specs list something like SI at "less than X %", you need to sort of ignore that part of the mix rather than thinking it's important to the steel spec: Extraneous "herbs and spices" seem to show up more in Mex and Chinese metals when tested. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy Ivan Posted October 4, 2016 Share Posted October 4, 2016 Remember that hardening is not limited to heat, quench, temper. Especially with exotic alloys, things such as stress relieving, cryo cycling, molten salts, marquenching, austempering and even pack quenching are needed. Likely more time consuming than is worth the effort (never mind the equipment ) to figure out on your own. It's not really gonna be easy to figure out what you need to do for a desirable HT here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted October 4, 2016 Author Share Posted October 4, 2016 Not that it makes much of a difference but I found out today these are ordered from a company from California that I cannot find any info online about. I found a full box with the name 'Project Engineering' and the address on W Allen Ave, San Dimas with a phone number. I called and spoke with a guy who told me that they buy the weaving blade steel from someone else and he doesn't have a clue as to what the alloy might even be close to. He was even nice enough to offer me some cuttoffs if I wanted some but I quickly changed the discussion back to trying to figure out an alloy. I'm thinking that I'll probably just use them as stock for small projects that will not require HT. I may also use a few for stiffeners on other projects. I am definitely starting to think the stuff would be better used that way instead of continuing to waste time a fuel playing with it. Thanks everyone for their help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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