Subject: Hardening Stainless

From: [email-masked] (Dan Wold)
Date: 20 Jan 1994 20:44:00 -0500

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?

Thanks,
Dan
=======================================================================
Daniel Wold                             Sysop: "WORLD CITIZEN" BBS
239 City Island Avenue                  718-885-2346 24 hours 14.4kbaud
City Island, Bronx, NY 10464            Internet: [email-masked]
                  Fidonet: Daniel.Wold@1:2603/503

---

From: [email-masked] (Harry Phinney)
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 1994 19:02:49 GMT

Dan Wold ([email-masked]) wrote:
: The  blade is 1/8" 316  alloy
: stainless-steel. 
: ...Can someone advise me
: on how to harden/temper  these blades to increase the durability?

I'm not a true expert on this, but I don't believe 316 stainless is
hardenable.  It's carbon content is low enough (<0.10%) that I don't
think you'll get any appreciable hardening via heat treatment.  It may
be possible to case harden the blades, but increasing the carbon content
of the surface (the point of case hardening) will likely significantly
decrease the corrosion resistance of the metal.  You'd probably be better
off (except perhaps financially :-() by selecting a different alloy,
such as one of the 400 series martensitic stainless steels which is
hardenable.

Harry Phinney   [email-masked]

---

From: [email-masked] (bui tho xuan)
Date: 22 Jan 1994 00:22:57 GMT

[email-masked] (Harry Phinney) writes:
>think you'll get any appreciable hardening via heat treatment.

Harry is correct.  The only other option (if it's not done already) 
is to get cold rolled instead of annealed SS.  This will increase
your strength/hardness some, and reduce corrosion resistance a little.

Otherwise, get martensitic stainless.

tho

---

From: [email-masked] ([email-masked])
Date: 28 Jan 1994 00:55:06 -0500

>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.

[email-masked]