Nickel steel

“ Nickel will not rust so it does not surprise one that with 22 per cent or more of nickel the steel is almost immune from ordinary corrosion. Steels containing from 25 to 46 per cent nickel are variously used for resistance wire, for valve stems, valves for motors, etc. The 36 per cent nickel steel is the alloy, “Invar,” which has such slight expansion and contraction with heat and cold that it is used for clock pendulums, watch parts and for parts of measuring instruments. ”

“ A nickel steel containing 36% of nickel has the property of retaining an almost constant volume when heated or cooled through a considerable range of temperature; it is therefore useful for the construction of pendulums and for measures of length. Another steel containing 45% of nickel has, like platinum, the same coefficient of expansion as glass. It can therefore be employed, instead of that costly metal, in the construction of incandescent lamps where a wire has to be fused into the glass to establish electric connexion between the inside and the outside of the bulb. ”

“ These two classes of properties tend to exclude each other, for, as a general rule, whatever tends to make iron and steel hard and strong tends to make it correspondingly brittle, and hence liable to break treacherously, especially under shock. Manganese steel and nickel steel form an important exception to this rule, in being at once very strong and hard and extremely ductile. Nickel steel, which usually contains from 3 to 3.50% of nickel and about 0.25% of carbon, combines very great tensile strength and hardness, and a very high limit of elasticity, with great ductility. ”

“ The alloy steels are all susceptible of case-hardening treatment; in fact, this is one of the most important heat treatments for such steels in the automobile industry. Nickel steel carburizes more slowly than common steel, the nickel seeming to have the effect of slowing down the rate of penetration. There is no Page 93 cloud without its silver lining, however, and to offset this retardation, a single treatment is often sufficient for nickel steel; for the core is not coarsened as much as low-carbon machinery steel and thus ordinary work may be quenched on the carburizing heat. ”

“ In exceptional cases, where the expense may be borne, we may expect soon to see nickel steel used for higher towers, longer bridge-spans, thinner boilers, than those of to-day. Part of the bridge crossing Blackwell’s Island, New York, is built of nickel steel. Even with costs at their present plane, it is worth while for the designer of machinery to remember that friction is reduced when masses become smaller, power for power. It is found profitable, for instance, to use nickel steel for the cylinders of automobiles of high power. ”

“ Nothing but the high price of nickel prevents these alloys from having wide utilization, for they mean lighter and therefore more economical machines and engines than those of ordinary steel. Many turbines actuated by water, steam or gas, are best operated at speeds forbidden to common steel, which would fly to pieces under the centrifugal stress exerted, yet these speeds are quite feasible and safe when nickel steel is employed. ”

“ Tin forms an important part of many alloys such as babbitt, Britannia metal, bronze, gun metal and bearing metals.
Nickel is important in mechanics because of its combinations with other metals as alloys. Pure nickel is grayish-white, malleable, ductile and tenacious. It weighs almost as much as steel and, next to manganese, is the hardest of metals. Nickel is one of the three magnetic metals, the others being iron and cobalt. The commonest alloy containing nickel is german silver, although one of its most important alloys is found in nickel steel. ”

“ Nickel-steel does not expand or contract as much as common steel, and for this reason it is made into clock pendulums, which must be of the same length the year round in order to keep the right time. As nickel does not rust in air or water, and resists the action of many acids, it is133 much used in plating other metals. It is in demand for cooking utensils, household articles, and plumbing equipment, as well as for automobile parts. Practically all the nickel contained in our five-cent pieces is from the Canadian mines. They are only one quarter nickel, however, the remainder being copper. ”

“ In nickel-steel there is promise of a very perfect material. This is an alloy of the ordinary Siemens-Martin steel with nickel, and called by the makers Yolla metal. It can be made to comply with all the ordinary tests applied to ship steel, in the way of ductility under stress, and at the same time have a breaking strength of 40 tons to the square inch as against 27 for ordinary steel. ”

“ Nickel is largely used as an alloy with other metals. Alloyed with copper it forms coin metal from which five-cent pieces are made, with copper and zinc it forms German silver, and when added to steel in small quantities nickel steel is formed which is much superior to common steel for certain purposes. When deposited by electrolysis upon the surface of other metals such as iron, it forms a covering which will take a high polish and protects the metal from rust, nickel not being acted upon by moist air. ”

“ Steel containing from 3 to 3.5 per cent of nickel is carburized between 1,650 and 1,750°F. Nickel steel containing less than 25 points of carbon, with this same percentage of nickel, may be slightly hardened by cooling in air instead of quenching. ”

“ Faraday found nickel steel to be more readily oxidised, not less, than ordinary steel. The platinum steel was also a failure. Silver steel was of more interest, though it was found impossible to incorporate in the alloy more than a small percentage of silver. Nevertheless, silver steel was used for some time by a Sheffield firm for manufacture of fenders. The alloys of iron with platinum, iridium, and rhodium were also of no great use. But the research demonstrated the surprising effects which minute quantities of other metals may have upon the quality of steel. ”

“ The addition of a few per cent of nickel to mild steel adds greatly to its strength—so much so that nickel steel is now world-renowned as used in armor-plate for navy vessels, and for great guns. Recent reports from the ordnance bureaus indicate that it will also be of great use in the barrels of small arms, by means of which they may be made lighter, and still of sufficient strength. ”

“ To weld high carbon to low carbon steel, the stock should be clamped in the dies with the low carbon stock sticking considerably further out from the die than the high carbon stock. Nickel steel welds readily, the nickel increasing the strength of the weld.
Iron and copper may be welded together by reducing the size of the copper end where it comes in contact with the iron. When welding copper and brass the pressure must be less than when welding iron. The metal is allowed to actually fuse or melt at the juncture and the pressure must be sufficient to force the burned metal out. ”

“ Nickel steel balances will always be found to have the cuts about one eighth of the circle distant from the arms instead of close to the arms. This is made necessary by the fact that the coefficient of nickel steel is about ten times less than that of ordinary steel, and if the cuts were made close to the arms the brass in expansion would force the free end of the rims to curve inward to such an extent that it would cause an abnormally fast rate in heat. ”

“ The tests for ordinary carbon gun steel are: “yield not less than 21 tons, breaking stress between 34 tons and 44 tons per square inch, and elongation 17%.”
The toughness of nickel steel forgings renders them much more difficult to machine, but the advantages have been so great that practically all barrels and hoops (except jackets) of modern guns are now made of this material.
The gun steel, whether of the carbon or nickel quality, used in England and most foreign countries, is prepared by the open hearth method in a regenerative gas furnace of the Siemens-Martin type (see Iron and Steel) . ”

“ Nickel steels present some curious phenomena. When containing small percentages of nickel (e.g. 0.84 or 3.82) , they behave under changes of temperature much like carbon steel. With a sample containing 7.65%, the phenomena after the permanent state had been reached were similar, but the first cooling produced a slight increase in magnetic moment. But steels containing 18.64 and 29% of nickel behaved very differently. The result of the first cooling was a reduction of the magnetic moment, to the extent of nearly 50% in the case of the former. ”

“ Nickel steel we do not use for the cheaper grades of guns, because it is so much harder, and costs so much more to work. Indeed, very few gun-makers use nickel steel for barrels at all, but we do on all our high-grade work."
"I notice," Hamilton said, "that all the steel here is stored in bars and rods. ”

“ Often the bolts, clips, nuts, pins, devices and other fittings are of special heat-treated nickel steel which must not be heated locally for bending or for attachment. Such work seriously weakens the steel. ”

“ Again, while iron, the carbon steels, and even the magnetic oxide of iron which contains only about 72 per cent of the metal, are strongly magnetic, manganese steel which has 85 per cent of iron is so non-magnetic that it is sometimes used in place of brass or bronze where an entirely non-magnetic material is required. The nickel steels with 24 per cent or more of nickel are also non-magnetic though both constituent metals, alone, are strongly attracted by the magnet. ”

“ Nickel steel, being especially hard and tough is used for armor plate, special machinery and wire rope. Nickel is extensively used for cheap electro plating.
Nickel and nickel oxide are exported to Holland and England from the United States and ores and matte are imported from Canada.
Petroleum (or coal oil) is obtained from wells in the United States, Russia, Dutch East Indies, Galicia, Roumania and other countries. More than half of the world’s output is from the United States, the leading districts being (1) Kansas and Oklahoma, (2) California, (3) Illinois, (4) Pennsylvania and (5) Texas. ”

“ The electric steel furnace, of modern construction, is a very important step forward in the melting of nickel steel; neither the crucible process nor basic or acid open-hearth furnaces give such good results. ”

“ Nagaoka and Honda, who employed a fluid dilatometer, found that the volume of several specimens of iron, steel and nickel was always slightly increased, no diminution being indicated in low fields; cobalt, on the other hand, was diminished in volume, and the amount of the change, though still very small, was greater than that shown by the other metals. Various nickel-steels all expanded under magnetization, the increase being generally considerable and proportional to the field; in the case of an alloy containing 29% of nickel the change was nearly 40 times greater than in soft iron. ”

“ The texture of carbon steel will be weakened by the prolonged high heat of carburizing, so that if we need a tough core, we must reheat it above its critical range, which is about 1,600°F. for soft steel, but lower for manganese and nickel steels. Quenching is done in either water, oil, or air, depending upon the results desired. The steel is then very carefully reheated to refine the case, the temperature varying from 1,350 to 1,450°F., depending on whether the material is an alloy or a simple steel, and quenched in either water or oil. ”

“ Low-carbon pearlitic-manganese steel, heat-treated, will give dynamic strength which cannot be equaled by low-priced and Page 30 necessarily low-content nickel steels. In many instances, it is preferable to use high-grade manganese steel, rather than low-content nickel steel. ”

“ Alloy steels have come into extensive use for important special purposes, and a very great increase of their use is to be expected. The chief ones are nickel steel, manganese steel, chrome steel and chrome-tungsten steel. The general order of merit of a given variety or specimen of iron or steel may be measured by the degree to which it combines strength and hardness with ductility. ”

“ Although a certain make of material may vary in composition from time to time the products of a manufacturer of good steel can be generally relied upon, and it is better to deal directly with him than with others.
In most cases the case-hardening steels can be chosen from the following: (1) Case-hardening mild steel of 0.20 per cent carbon; (2) case-hardening 31⁄2 per cent nickel steel; (3) case-hardening nickel-chromium steel; (4) case-hardening chromium vanadium. ”

“ These furnaces accommodate from 12 to 16 crown gears. The carbon-steel gears are heated in a reducing atmosphere to about 1,425°F. (depending on the carbon content) placed in the dies in the Gleason quenching machine, and quenched between dies in mineral oil at less than 100°F. The test gear receives exactly the same treatment as the others and is then broken, giving a record of the condition of both case and core.
Affinity of Nickel Steel for Carbon.—The carbon- and nickel-steel gears are carburized separately owing to the difference in time necessary for their carburization. ”

“ Page 122 Annealing Method.—Forgings which are too hard to machine are put in pots with a little charcoal to cause a reducing atmosphere and to prevent scale. The covers are then luted on and the pots placed in the furnace. Carbon steel from 15 to 25 points is annealed at 1,600°F. Nickel steel of the same carbon and containing in addition 31⁄2 per cent nickel is annealed at 1,450°F. When the pots are heated through, they are rolled to the yard and allowed to cool. This method of annealing gives the best hardness for quick machining. ”