Stainless steel spring grade

brooker2008uk · Jan 5, 2014

I am looking to get a spring made for a manual hand operation lock. It would involve pushing down and compression the spring as well as twisting 90 degrees to unlock. I would like the spring to twist back automatically in the locked position as well. Can someone please recommend me the stainless material and grade I would need to make this

hotrodder · Jan 5, 2014

Spring steels are typically hardened and tempered. The flavours of stainless being talked about in the other thread are known as 'austenitic' which is one of several families of stainless. Austenitics (2xx and 3xx series) are the most common flavours of stainless used and have excellent corrosion resistance but are only hardenable by cold working (strain hardening). 301 apparently gets some use as spring steel but i've no idea how good it is with regards to fatigue life (spring life) compared with other spring steels, stainless or otherwise. Martensitic stainless is heat treatable but the corrosion resistance isn't as good. It sees use in knives and the like as well as springs, i think 420 is the usual suspect for the latter

Twist (torsion) is generally a harder life than bending (leaf spring) with regards to fatigue life, whether that'd make a difference with regards to the suitability of say 301 i don't know

Lawnmowerboy · Jan 5, 2014

Precipitation hardening stainless steels are suitable for spring making. 301 work hardens rather quickly. There is specialist suppliers of spring stainless if you Google it.