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Old 04-29-2006, 20:15   #6
Bill Harsey
Bladesmith to the Quiet Professionals
 
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Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Oregon, Land of the Silver Grey Sunsets
Posts: 3,879
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Reaper
That was not a single question, but was a variety of topics that I would like to know more about.

Hope that at least some of it is in the direction you were looking.

TR
Yes, you asked a very good series of questions and my response referring to that as a single question was an attempt at understatement.
Yes this is the direction I hoped to go. Well done.

First basic, steel in it's most basic form is iron with carbon. The higher the carbon content, the more the steel can be hardened by heat treating which involves heating a given steel to it's "transformation point" and a rapid, controlled cooling to lock the carbides into a particular type of structure. The more carbon a steel has, the more potential it has to be hardened.
An even simpler definition of heat treating steel is "changing the physical characteristics without changing the chemical composition".

The three most basic categories of steel are Mild Steel, Medium Carbon Steel and high carbon steel. There are many alloys of steels within each of these groups.
Here are some simple examples of the carbon steels:
Low carbon steels: structural steels, car bodies, common steel purchased for welding AKA "mild steel", etc.
Medium carbon steels: Firearm barrels, hammers, gears, axles, spring steels, etc.
High carbon steels: Knives, machine tooling, punches, forming dies, drill bits, milling cutters, saws, spring steels etc.

more to follow.
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