What's new
What's new

Tool material question for striking wrench

Considering you are reducing the size, and assuming you are using it to maximum capacity it appears you would need something significantly stronger than the original material. So then questions arise. What was it made of? Do you have ability to heat treat? Are you in a hurry? Is this for personal use or manufacturing? Other?

Not to scare you off of a good project, but it all matters depending on your intentions.

A decent option for the quick and handy is, as mentioned by crossthread, 4140ph ( aka 4140cdht )
It readily available, decently tough and still machinable, in the half hard state it is supplied in. We stock tons ( literally) of this steel.

But there are better options in tool steels such as D2. Or S7 ( and many others) but they require Machining pre heat treatment. And some require strict heat treatment processing.

A quick search of any of the steels you choose will give you all the information about strength values and heat treatment you may need.

Good luck with it.
 
An adapter sounds easiest. It's off the shelf, cheap and much easier to replace if something gets twisted off at the transition.

Or.... if one is handy with an 5" angle grinder ;)
 
Thanks for the suggestions. An adapter really isn’t an option due to space. I have adapters. I’ve had to cut down a socket to fit. I used 4140 and actually cracked it. I don’t think it was 4140ph.
 
If I want near ultimate impact resistance and strength. L6 is hard to beat. Used to be listed in Carpenter's book as oil tough in their star chart. at 55 RC it is out of an Izod impact resitstance machine's capacity to break it.
At 55RC tensile strength is about 270KSI and yield is about 260KSI. Easy to machine when annealed also. One of the members here was machining prehard L6, I asked him where he got it but he never replied.
 
mill it to size?

otherwise there is 8670, maraging 300/18ni (easy heat treat) or spezial steels like vanadis 4 and z-tuff. d2 would be a bad choise. L6 is o.k., but should be in bainitic state (hard to do) ,as is 5160. remember: suitable heat treat is more important than the alloy.
 
interesting you mention 300M. do you have practical experience with it? if i look it up the difference to 4340 is marginal. i always wondered why they used to make such a fuss about it, racing axles and such.

(in the end what i think is marginal probably makes the difference between breaking and surviving, around 10% in strenghth/toughnes from memory.)
 
interesting you mention 300M. do you have practical experience with it? if i look it up the difference to 4340 is marginal. i always wondered why they used to make such a fuss about it, racing axles and such.

(in the end what i think is marginal probably makes the difference between breaking and surviving, around 10% in strenghth/toughnes from memory.)

Isn't 300M VIM-VAR (Vacuum Induction Melted then Vacuum Arc Remelted)? Very clean - much lower chance of fatigue failure. The added alloy allow the yield strength to reach over 200 ksi in large sections. Both very desirable.
 








 
Back
Top