SS 303 Thermal Treatment 1

[kristofer29]

Is there any way to harden 303 stainless? I have a SS 303 part that interacts with a part made out of a harder steel - I'm still trying to find out what kind of steel. Either way, I need the 303 part to be harder. Can it be thermally treated, or does the material need to changed? Thanks...

 

[NickE]

303 is an austenitic SS so there are only a few ways to harden it. Look in the metallurgy fourm for the phrase kolsterizing, Kolene, or surface hardening stainless.

303 is also easy to machine, so if you change matl to a 410/420/440 hardenable martensitic SS you will have different machining behavior. Also you will likely need a finish grind to get good dimensional tolerances.

good luck.

Nick
I love materials science!

 

[unclesyd]

As refered to by NickE;
We used numerous intricate parts made from 303 SS. 99% of the parts were Liquid Nitrided using the Kolene process and we got excellant results in respect to wear.
We had no luck with gas nitriding.