Spring steel

[Sonic EscapeParticipant @sonicescape38234]

On a nearby scrap yard there are a lot of railway car springs. I read that spring steel has low machinability. What else would it be useful for besides making a knife or … springs?

[FulmenParticipant @fulmen]

Anything that needs to be hard. It’s heat treatable carbon steel.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Old car springs used to be a carbon steel much used in Africa for making machetes. Anything less than 40 years old is likely to be a more sophisticated steel that might not be so easy to work and temper. Need to try a bit.

[Speedy Builder5Participant @speedybuilder5]

I was given a set of wood turning tools – all forged from those springs.

Bob

[jaCK HobsonParticipant @jackhobson50760]

A risk with old springs is that they are subject to stress/fatigue cracking which might be tricky to detect… until you make something and it breaks at heat treat.

Good for bodging up tools. Risky if you are going to invest a lot of time into the material. So bodge up a machete – fine, but don’t use it for high-end fancy knives.

The steel is often optimised for a bit more toughness (and resistance to stress cracking) than ultimate hardness – so might not be perfect knife steel.

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