Subject: Re: Hardening Stainless

From: [email-masked] (Eric Perozziello)
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 94 19:31:42 GMT

>>
>>>I've been making sidewalk ice-choppers.  The  blade is 1/8" 316  alloy
>>>stainless-steel. I grind a chisel edge onto the blade. Can someone advise me
>>>on how to harden/temper  these blades to increase the durability?
>>
>>Unfortunately, you are using an alloy which is not heat treatable. Its
>>main claim to fame is its corrosion resistance. The only way I know to
>>harden it is by work hardening. If you bought 1/8" sheet, it is probably
>>already as hard as it is going to get. You could use a 400-series
>>stainless and still have good corrosion resistance, but heat treating it
>>to increase its hardness would be tricky without special equipment. It
>>could be done easily by a commercial heat treating shop.
>
>Someone correct me if I'm wrong, (like I had to ask  :^)
>but isn't the 300 series stainless steel more corrosion
>resistant to SALT water than the 400 series?  I seem to 
>recall that the 300 series is used for marine applications....

The reason I mentioned this, is because the user will probably expose
the blades to SALT water since salt is generally used in melting ice.

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: 28 Jan 94 16:07:56 -0800

> the blades to SALT water since salt is generally used in melting ice.

Yes it is true the heat treatable stainless steels do not have the corrosion
resistence of the 300 series but the 300 series is not heat treatable.
You could use 400 series however you could also use 17-4 ph or 15-5 ph.
These two stainless steels are much easier to heat treat than 400 SS.
17-4 ph ( ph stands for precipitation hardening ) is easily heat treated
by heating to 900 deg. for one hour then air cool. About the same process
for 15-5.