Scra99tch
Mechanical
- Mar 13, 2023
- 3
Hello,
I am looking at different tool steels that I grind for cold forming threads. What I have been finding is that dies we buy from a vendor often marked, M1, D2, M4, etc, almost always grind better than stuff we buy M2, D2, DC53, DCMX. All of these are not drastically different in their makeup and are all within a few points of Rockwell C hardness 59-63.
This leads me to believe that the metal itself is not the issue, the issue I feel is how the metal is heat treated.
My question is what could a heat treatment facility do differently for a vendor vs someone off the street looking for just some specific hardness.
The reason I feel this may be the case is I can run roughly the same parameters on my grinder, wheel speed, feed rate, dressing ratio, depth of cut and the vendor die cuts very clean and the material we buy will burn right away.
I've still got a ways to go to hone my grinding parameters but it just bugs me that there is that big of a difference across the board of all the materials I've bought vs the vendor material I regrind.
We've had a few reports done on the make up of "their" material vs ours. What I have noticed is that the M1 specifically does have a 1.5% makeup of tungsten which I believe resists the re-tempering of the steel when heat is applied.
The other option is to grind soft, heat treat, then finish grind but this will add quite a bit of lead time and does not make sense as I am able to grind "vendor" dies no problem at their final hardness, with my current wheel technology.
Thank you and looking forward to any thoughts on the matter. If you think this may do better in a grinding machining specific forums just let me know.
I am looking at different tool steels that I grind for cold forming threads. What I have been finding is that dies we buy from a vendor often marked, M1, D2, M4, etc, almost always grind better than stuff we buy M2, D2, DC53, DCMX. All of these are not drastically different in their makeup and are all within a few points of Rockwell C hardness 59-63.
This leads me to believe that the metal itself is not the issue, the issue I feel is how the metal is heat treated.
My question is what could a heat treatment facility do differently for a vendor vs someone off the street looking for just some specific hardness.
The reason I feel this may be the case is I can run roughly the same parameters on my grinder, wheel speed, feed rate, dressing ratio, depth of cut and the vendor die cuts very clean and the material we buy will burn right away.
I've still got a ways to go to hone my grinding parameters but it just bugs me that there is that big of a difference across the board of all the materials I've bought vs the vendor material I regrind.
We've had a few reports done on the make up of "their" material vs ours. What I have noticed is that the M1 specifically does have a 1.5% makeup of tungsten which I believe resists the re-tempering of the steel when heat is applied.
The other option is to grind soft, heat treat, then finish grind but this will add quite a bit of lead time and does not make sense as I am able to grind "vendor" dies no problem at their final hardness, with my current wheel technology.
Thank you and looking forward to any thoughts on the matter. If you think this may do better in a grinding machining specific forums just let me know.
