Klarinet Archive - Posting 000265.txt from 1996/06

From: Steve Prescott <mipresc@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: Reed Knives
Date: Mon, 17 Jun 1996 15:59:33 -0400

Ed lacy wrote, regarding reed knives: "I'm sure we have all noticed
that our Swiss army knives don't rust very readily. That's because they
are made of stainless steel (look for the word "rostfrei" on it if it is
the genuine article). This means that the steel has a high nickle
content, and as a result it is a relatively soft metal."

Ed,

Are you stating that nickel is what gives (stainless) steel its properties?

Stanless steel has chromium, not nickel.

Please read the excerpt below, quoted from Microsoft Bookshelf Encyclopedia:

steel, ALLOY of IRON, CARBON, and small proportions of other elements.
Steelmaking involves the removal of iron's impurities and the addition of
desirable alloying elements. Steel was first made by cementation, a process
of heating bars of iron with charcoal so that the surface of the iron
acquired a high carbon content. The bars were then fused together, yielding
a metal harder and stronger than the individual bars but lacking uniformity
in these properties. The crucible method, consisting of melting iron
together with other substances in a crucible, is one of the costlier
steelmaking processes, employed only for making special steels (e.g., the
famous blades of Damascus). The BESSEMER PROCESS, the open-hearth process,
and the basic oxygen process are more widely used. Steel is often
classified by its carbon content: a high-carbon steel is hard and brittle;
low- or medium-carbon steel can be welded and tooled. Alloy steels, now the
most widely used, contain one or more elements that give them special
properties. Aluminum steel is smooth and has a high tensile strength.
Chromium steel is used in automobile and airplane parts because of its
hardness, strength, and elasticity. Nickel steel is the most widely used of
the alloys; it is nonmagnetic and has the tensile properties of high-carbon
steel without the brittleness. Stainless steel has a high tensile strength
and resists abrasion and corrosion because of its high chromium content; it
is used in kitchen utensils and plumbing fixtures.

The Concise Columbia Encyclopedia is licensed from Columbia University
Press. Copyright @-----.

Steve.

Steve Prescott
Instrument Rep.Tech./ Clarinetist
Indiana State University
mipresc@-----.edu

   
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