Thanks, again, McGuire!
'sorry for the delay in responding. I appreciate the additional information that you provided. Having worked in a stainless steel mill, you must have acquired a lot of valuable knowledge concerning these alloys.
I can appreciate the complexities in the relationships between YS, and Hardness, %Cold Work, and other parameters that you mention. I'm just a bit "frustrated" that when I purchase 303SS "Shaft stock" from someone like W.M. Berg I am left nearly "clueless" as to the state of the material -- though I suspect this rod stock is in a fairly "soft" condition (annealed to say 7%CW?). I cannot get any thermo-mechanical history on the material. The broad Hardness spec given in the catalog (RB75 to RB95) is fairly useless in defining the material for engineering calculations. In fact, RB75 appears to be very low for 303SS; I find that annealed 303SS is more like RB83. I suppose one must buy special order rod stock to achieve any level of certainty about its yield point, etc.
Would you know if the 303SS "Shafting stock" that is typically sold is, in fact, in an Annealed state? -- or if some of it is still in a cold-worked, "Hard-drawn Rod" condition? Much of the "Shafting stock" in the 4xx alloys are deliberately hardened (even induction or case hardened), thereby providing much higher hardnesses and yield points. FYI, my original question stemmed from a desire to estimate the onset of yield in a "beam" of this 303SS shaft material. I was, frankly, surprised to find that W.M. Berg could tell me NOTHING about the condition of their 303SS "Shafting stock" (beyond the Hardness spec in the catalog)! Even if one tensile tests a given lot of the material, there is no guarantee that the next lot will be at all similar. So, I suppose it's "par for the course"!
Thanks much for all your comments/suggestions, McGuire!
C. Schell, Sr. ME
Lasentec, A Mettler Toledo Co.