driveshaft material

[BrokenBiker]

old boy up the road has just stopped me to ask a favour. i do a few for him every now and then, he has a wonderful mind but not so clever with the hands so when he needs something welding back together i generally sort him out. he saw me shifting the lathe sunday and has now asked would i be able to turn down a bit of bar he cut from between 2 CV joints on a FWD driveshaft?

design isnt an issue, few different diameters, few chamfers, needs to fit in a bushing from some old hand made hoisting type device he uses on the allotment to basically winch his wheelbarrow up a hill...

anyway, my main concern is, whats it likely to be made of? its off a 10 year old micra, so its probably a renault part if that makes any difference.

as an aside, what would the splines and cv housing be made of?

 

[addjunkie]

Outside is usually very hard, once through its quite soft. I have in the past shortened ford ones, joined with a fillet weld in a jig to keep strainght, then sleeved the joint and welded again.

Think they are forged but not sure.

 

[brightspark]

a lot are carbon steel en 21 is one of them and heat treated as required

 

[BrokenBiker]

Outside is usually very hard, once through its quite soft. I have in the past shortened ford ones, joined with a fillet weld in a jig to keep strainght, then sleeved the joint and welded again.

Think they are forged but not sure.

the thickest part of this bit he wants turned will see about 3mm off the cuuretn diameter, so 1.5mm depth of cut, reckon that will get through the hard layer?

 

[BrokenBiker]

a lot are carbon steel en 21 is one of them and heat treated as required

potential to anneal then? sounds like it could be an option, i have an induction heater that would handle the bit needed

 

[addjunkie]

the thickest part of this bit he wants turned will see about 3mm off the cuuretn diameter, so 1.5mm depth of cut, reckon that will get through the hard layer?

I suspect so, but its been a while since I did it. Your machine should machine it no problem with a tipped tool.

 

[Kram]

Likely to be a case hardening steel, some grades listed here

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[minimutly]

Don't know about case hardened steel, why would you need to? But, some makers certainly harden the outside somehow, Vauxhall are amongst the hardest I've machined, old Austin Rover the softest. Run a file across it, if it flies off the shaft is hard. If you want to machine without annealing you can with hard inserts, forget HSS.
The centre will be relatively soft.

 

[BrokenBiker]

well, he has apparently dropped the material off...and by that i mean when i got home there was a FWD driveshaft by the front door i assumed he just had a bit of the shaft material but no, its a full driveshaft...

good news is, good quality file cuts it quite easilly so i think an angle grinder may sort the CV joints out, they can go in the scrap bucket for now, then cut a small section off and try it on the lathe tomorrow when new belt arrives, see how it cuts...