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Ukraine Material?

Fal Grunt

Titanium
Joined
Aug 5, 2010
Location
Medina OH
It seems like any more it is a total crapshoot where material comes from. The quality also seems to be a total crapshoot.

If any of you have a supplier of A2 that is US PLEASE let me know so I can give them a call.

Supplier says batch of A2 hails from Ukraine. Anyone every machined any of this? What were your results after heat treat?
 
All the A-2 I ever use comes from McMaster, never got certs, but always ran good, but of course it was small rounds.
 
We use a lot from Diamond Metals, it works well(quality wise no issues). Origin? Cannot say for sure. But they are local.
 
All the A-2 I ever use comes from McMaster, never got certs, but always ran good, but of course it was small rounds.

Typically I have found the variance is when heat treated. I have had A2 different sizes from different sources come back different colors, different levels of scale, and different hardness. All run in the same batch of heat treat. I've also noticed it grinds different.

I think a lot of it is the alloys, and while I have been told before, XX material is XX material regardless of where it comes from... I think that's a LOAD of BS.

Maybe the Ukrainian stuff is great... I have no idea. I did a job for a customer last year with some Czechoslovakian 4140 Q&T that machined great.

Problem for me is the small quantities I order. If I get it, I have to order several bars. I don't want to be stuck with a bunch of CRAP.
 
... while I have been told before, XX material is XX material regardless of where it comes from... I think that's a LOAD of BS.
It is a load of bs. Look at the specs, materials can have "up to" or "at least" or "between x and y" amounts of all different components. That doesn't even mention the way it's manufactured or the grain size or several other things that affect behavior.

Alloys of the same number are similar, but not the same, even from the same supplier. Just like milling and turning, there's tolerances.
 
Pacific Machinery and Tool Steel in Portland Oregon might be worth a try. I have bought cut pieces of A2 from them and had it shipped a few times. The last was 2" diameter x 3/4" long, around 30pcs. No complaints from me or them considering it was a small order. In stock, shipped in 2-3 days, easy to talk to, acceptable price. Until something changes they have my business.
 
Not sure if I've ever had anything from Ukraine specifically, but I have cut a good amount of Russian Ti and Al and never had any issues. Lots of forged steel from the ex-soviet eastern European countries. All good. I don't imagine there will be much wrong with Ukrainian stainless.

All the stainless I have on the shop floor right now is from Finland (Outokumpu) or Spain (AcerINOX, Roldan), some odd pieces from Italy and France. Got some Ti which says Japan on the cert which I think is a first.

If it's not from China then it's probably just fine TBH.
 
Not sure if I've ever had anything from Ukraine specifically, but I have cut a good amount of Russian Ti and Al and never had any issues.

I have a plate of 1" 7075 from RU that I'm pretty sure has porosity issues. I've not done a proper sample prep and etch to confirm, but visually there seems to be lots of very small pits in areas that have been cut, so I've set this chunk aside for non-critical work.

The pitfalls of opportunity buying (rando piece sitting at a suppliers that I grabbed).
 
I have a plate of 1" 7075 from RU that I'm pretty sure has porosity issues. I've not done a proper sample prep and etch to confirm, but visually there seems to be lots of very small pits in areas that have been cut, so I've set this chunk aside for non-critical work.

The pitfalls of opportunity buying (rando piece sitting at a suppliers that I grabbed).

I'm sure it's possible to get bad Al from Russia, but in fairness, you can get bad material from anywhere. I've had faulty metals from Norway, Denmark, Italy, even from the US. It happens, doesn't mean any particular country can't be trusted. It's possible to get good material from China too, but obviously the risks are higher. Took a chance on some Chinese Gr5 Ti last year and it was really nasty smeary crap, would cut ok for a bit and then suddenly hit a gummy patch. Parts looked like shit when done. A good number of our customers won't accept anything made with Chinese COO material.

FWIW, the bulk of the Al here that came from Russia was also 7075, but I have a big chunk of Russian (KUMZ) 6082T6 in a machine right now, and it's cutting great.

Aluminium extruded section is a different matter, pretty difficult to source any that's not Chinese COO.
 
I use Carpenter/Crucible/Latrobe tool steels all of the time. So happens their Ontario Latrobe warehouse is only 15 mins away, but they are great to deal with, and a bit better price then Uddeholm(the steel store). Carpenter bought out all the above names, but still sells under the 3 brands.
 








 
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