Do you know what tool steel is? It is a variety of carbon and alloy steel that are used for tool making. Tool steels carry characteristics like distinctive hardness, deformation resistance, and suitability at elevated temperatures. Because of their unique features, they are taken as the best material to shape other materials.
There are varieties of tool steel that are named differently in the scenarios. H steels are similar to Chromium hot work tool steels. These steels are mainly designed to withstand the conditions such as heat, high pressure, and abrasion that commonly occur in various production processes. Usually, these steels face everything under high temperatures and experience actions like shearing, punching, and shaping metals.
H steels are further categorized between H1 and H19 steels, and each one has its features and characteristics.
What is H13 tool steel?
H13 steel is one such category of H steel that is used for hot work tooling applications. Its tough body and fatigue resistance make it more suitable for tooling applications than any other tool steel.
It can bear rapid cooling for those high operating temperatures, which makes it perfectly useful in plastic moulds, die casting, and thermoplastic dies.
What is its chemical composition?
The H13 tool steel’s chemical composition is as follows:
- Carbon-0.35-0.40
- Chromium-4.75-5.50
- Molybdenum-1.10-1.75
- Manganese-0.20-0.50
- Vanadium-0.80-1.20
- Silicon-0.80-1.20
- Phosphorus-0.030
- Sulfur-0.030
While carrying out the operations using H13 steel, the following temperature range is suitable:
- 1825-1900 °F for hardening
- Tempering temperature: 1000–1200 °F
What are its physical properties?
To find out about the physical properties of H13 tool steel, you have to check out its melting point and density, which are as follows:
- 1427 °C is the melting point.
- At 20 °C, the density is 7.80 g/cm3.
What about its mechanical properties?
H13 steel tends to show different reactions upon heating. Here are a few glimpses:
- Area reduction: 50%
- Modulus of elasticity- 215 GPa at 20 °C
- Tensile strength range- 1000-1380 MPa and 1200-1590 MPa
- Poisson’s ratio: 0.27–0.30
Lastly, its thermal properties
The H13 thermal properties take you towards the expansion that is recorded as 10.4 x 10-6/°C. The suitable temperature range is 20–100 °C, and its thermal conductivity at 215 °C is 28.6 W/mK.
Is there any advantage to using H13 tool steel?
H13 tool steel comes with the following advantages:
- It offers high heat resistance.
- It has excellent thermal and shock resistance.
- It had a strong stability feature.
- It is known for its strong and tough color.
- It is widely preferred for its better hardness and mechanical properties.
What are the applications of H13 tool steel?
H13 tool steel is widely used for extrusion and in plastic moulds. However, apart from this, its application can be seen in:
- Core pins for injection moulds
- Forging dies
- Shrunk rings
- Shot sleeves for die casting.
- Trimming dies
- cavities for casting dies and many more.
The use of H13 tool steel can be improved by applying the surface treatment process over it. This will improve its mechanical properties. H13 is a great choice for tooling applications. Its features like good hardness, abrasion resistance, and shock resistance made it like this.