Cutting a slot in a 304 stainless steel part?

[Larry$]

Which brings me to the question: If I screwup a part by work hardening it, can I "normalize" it using the referenced method?

 

[pontiac428]

Which brings me to the question: If I screwup a part by work hardening it, can I "normalize" it using the referenced method?

Yes! You certainly can.

I tend to get hung up on small distinctions, especially where the mechanism of action is different. It's down in the weeds usually, so don't take my diversions as criticism. I like to share understanding, and I can be wrong and I always learn new things. I'm trying to act as more of a distiller than a pundit by discussing the nuances.

My dad was a stainless steel process guru at the end of his career. He was solving problems with welding processes and metallurgy from hammer mills to hydropower. He revised Wheel Vintiques' robotic processes before he retired from Praxair in the late '90s, and halved their process costs. I spent a lot of time on the road with him seeing these places, especially PNW dams. Anyway, he worked for Stoody for a long time. Stoody is known for two things only, hardfacing and stainless. I have a hard copy of their stainless engineering manual, it's superb reading material. I'm going to see if I can find a pdf online, I'd like to share it.

 

[francist]

I don't do a lot of work with stainless but for someone who does that might be a valuable thing to experiment with. You know, rather than waiting to screw up an actual part why not try it out on a bit of scrap to see how viable it is. Can I get it to the 2000-plus degrees needed, what does that look like, and does it return to essentially the same workability as it was before work hardening? Seems like that'd be a useful thing to know.

 

[BGHansen]

Since you already have the screws made, maybe try cutting the slots with a Dremel tool cut off wheel?

Bruce