Does anyone recognise this stuff [presumed Stainless Steel]

A lucky find at the local Scrap Merchant:

Six large ‘washers’ 180mm diameter and 50mm bore

... made from 4mm plate, with an unusual [cast, or cleverly rolled?] texture, and very flat

... the machined details look encouragingly smooth and shiny !

... it is only very slightly magnetic, and I’m presuming it to be an Austenitic Stainless Steel

The intriguing bit [aside from the surface texture] is that I have found just one small trace of an identification mark:

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Does anyone recognise this

MichaelG.

My guess is that the surface pattern is a result of shot-peening or blasting, with a fairly coarse abrasive. And Stainless stock is sometimes marked in dots as you show - from a Laser printer (probably). All you need now is a use for them ...

Cheers, Tim

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I have a use for them, Tim ... they will become interface plates for mounting work on the rotary table of the BCA

MichaelG.

I have some SS discs of very similar appearancexcept that they are smaller diameter. They were end paking plates for the 105mm cartridge for the 'Abbot' self propelled howitzer, now defunct. The cartridges were packed in pairs in carboard tubes inside long brown Nato ammo boxes....

I used four of the discs to stabilise my Chinese mini-lathe by replacing the rubber feet and tehy worked extremely well....in fact they turned it into a different machine.

You may find it difficult to machine, I would use the sharpest hss tools and use aluminium grade inserts if you use carbide.

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Thanks for the thought ... I will report back if/when I have any difficulty, but I suspect that I will only be drilling/reaming/tapping etc. The plates are already a good size & shape for what I want.

Judging by the machining that has already been done on them, I don’t anticipate any big problems.

I would really like to identify the material though ... just in case it’s something tricky.

My guess [hope] is that it’s the Stainless Steel equivalent of Aluminium Alloy ‘Tooling Plate’

MichaelG.

That looks like a hot rolled mill finish -

I've got some stainless strip here that looks the same (one of the 400 grades, I think):

I suspect it's hot rolled & descaled, but don't know for sure. I've seen full (~2m x 1m) plates with the same finish.

There are several finish options - I would guess this is 1D or 1E

Thanks a lot, Andy

That ties-in nicely with my hopes and assumptions

... Just didn’t know the right words !

MichaelG.

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[quote]
 

1D / 1E – Hot Rolled Plate

Hot rolled, softened (annealed) with the surface de-scaled.  The surface remains rough and heavily pitted and subsequent finishing is limited to heavy grinding.  It can be used where uniformity and smoothness of finish are not important and where a heavy ground surface is acceptable.

Typical uses include gas turbine parts, incinerators, kiln liners and oil burner parts.

[/quote]

The “rough and heavily pitted” surface is of no consequence to me, because the overall flatness of these particular discs is excellent [rather like a granite surface plate, where the dings don’t matter much].

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 08/04/2021 20:27:21