comparison of steel characteristics 1

[ColinScowen]

One of our suppliers is having trouble locating stock of a particular steel, 20CrMn, and they want to offer us 20CrMo as an alternative.
Now, I am an electronic engineer by training, becoming more mechanical as my job progresses, but I have no idea where to look for the characteristics of these two steels.
Can anyone point me to a good source of info for this.

Regards,

Colin.

 

[dbaird]

You might try:

http://www.matweb.com/search/SearchComp.asp

David Baird

Sr Controls Designer
EET degree.
Journeyman Electrician.

 

[TVP]

Colin,

Unfortunately, Matweb is not going to describe the properties that are likely important for your application. These steels are carburizing grades, which means that they are used for surface hardened components like gears and shafts. The most important details are going to be the heat treating requirements (case depth, hardness, etc.), and not the exact steel grade. It is quite possible that 20CrMo will be an adequate alternative, but we would need additional information on the part, the loading requirements, and the heat treat specification on the drawing.

 

[ColinScowen]

case hardened to 50 HRC to a depth of 0.2.
Application is a threaded bush holding a side handle to a power tool.
The actual heat treatment is not specified on the drawing.

 

[JStephen]

You need to go back to whoever designed it in the first place and see why that grade was used. It might have been overkill to begin with, might have been using up surplus stock, who knows?

 

[TVP]

Either of the stated grades can easily meet this requirement.