Steel is a very useful material that is used in a multitude of applications. In fact, it’s believed that more than 55 percent of a car is composed of steel. Its versatility is determined by the kind of alloy elements used to create it, because these elements impact the overall strength as well as durability and performance. The manner in which metal is cooled can have a major impact on its microstructure, and therefore its overall properties. It can be manipulated to obtain specific properties, such as machinability yielding strength, and corrosion resistance.
Steel is iron which has had other elements alloyed to it in order to improve its physical properties and make it suitable for specific uses. The proportions of the other alloying elements determines what category of steel a particular steel is part of and its overall performance for different applications.
For instance stainless is composed of at least 11 percent of chromium. This makes it invulnerable against corrosion. This characteristic is what makes it ideal for a broad range of kitchen appliances and cutlery. Tool steel is a preferred material because of its high hardness and resistance to abrasion. It’s also used for hand tools and machine dies. Carbon steels can also be adapted to a wide range of applications due to their high ductility. Electrical steel is, however, is an example of a very specialized grade of steel that is composed of silicon (typically 3%). This increases its magnetic properties and decreases the loss of eddy current, making it great for transformer cores and electric motor laminations.