Spring steel is a group of low to high carbon steel products with excellent yield strength, able to withstand significant bending or twisting without deforming. The alloys include silicone and are hardened and cold rolled after casting. Products include saw blades, tape measures, coil springs, and vehicle suspension items. Spring steel products can be found in everyday items such as locks, key rings, and mousetraps.
The term spring steel refers to a group of low to medium to high carbon steel products that exhibit excellent yield strength. The term yield strength refers to the ability of a material to withstand significant bending or twisting and to return to its original shape without deforming. Spring steel alloys typically include silicone in their composition and are hardened and cold rolled after casting to improve yield strength. Products made from this type of steel are usually cold drawn as wire or sheared from flat material. Typical uses include saw blades, tape measure, coil springs and vehicle suspension items.
Spring steel alloys have the unique feature of being able to withstand significant twisting or bending forces without any distortion. Products made with these steel alloys can be bent, compressed, stretched or twisted continuously and will return to their original shape without undergoing any deformation. This characteristic is defined as a high yield strength and is a result of the specific composition and hardening of the steel alloy. Spring steels are medium to high carbon content alloys generally with a carbon content of 0.5 to 1.0 percent. Other alloy additives typically include manganese and silicone with silicone being the key component in high yield strengths.
The alloy material is cold worked after casting to preserve and improve yield strength values as heating the spring steel after manufacturing can adversely affect the impact strength of the alloy. This means that steel components generally cannot be welded conventionally unless they are subsequently hardened. The alloys are usually cold drawn or rolled into flat sheet or wire and hardened to Rockwell C values between 42 and 60. The products are then coiled using wire or punched from the flat plates. Intricate parts are often formed from soft annealed material and are only hardened when complete.
Spring steels can be used to produce a wide variety of products that supply energy or absorb various forces. These types of products include a huge variety of coil, coil and flat springs, vehicle suspension elements and toy mechanisms. Items such as tape measure and steel rulers are also made from various grades of spring steel. The yield strength of materials is also exploited in the production of tools such as saw blades and scrapers. Spring steel products can also be found in everyday items such as locks, key rings, door locking mechanisms, and even the humble mousetrap.
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