Where in my reply did I state special or otherwise?
Also since you're stating you're a expert in such details. Then, you are aware of the different steps in finishing and processing of steel forgings.
And what extra steps some manufactures undertake in the final processing of said product.
Why is it when I read some of your replies you always come off as angry and belligerent??
Then, moments later you edit you post to tone it down from the original?
I have read probably 25 threads with you first screaming, then later editing your replies to a more neutral reply . . .
Relax, take a deep breath . . . Let it all out . . .
Oh god, harden up. I'm not anywhere close to "belligerent" in any of my posts. I have strong opinions, if you can't deal with it, put me on ignore.
The reason I edit my posts is so that oversensitive people don't get their feelings hurt... it seems to happen all the time when you feel strongly about what you write.
Screaming?
edit: Uh oh, I edited my post, that means I was SCREAMING
To answer your question, I'm an expert in just about any manufacturing process involving metals, plastics, or composites. Wood, not so much. I worked at an aerospace R&D facility that also did contract scientific research, and had to use just about every modern manufacturing technique in existence to accomplish the tasks at hand. If you can name it, I've probably done it.
It doesn't mean I'm an expert in everything, but it means that I generally know what the **** I'm talking about.
I've personally conducted heat treatements, and I've also done my fair share of plating, using electrolysis, electroless, and vapor metallization. I am VERY familiar with surface preparation and treatment. Some of things I had to go through make the treatments done in traditional plating look like a joke.
I've worked in tool & die for over 20 years, of which 5 were in ultra high precision cutting tools for aerospace, military and other projects. Of which we used a wide range of heat treaters and over the years I've found that it is no way as consistent as you imply. First off batch to batch of steel there are differences, since the recipe has a +/- to the quantities of alloys. Certs from the mills are for the most part ran off of a copier, at one company alone we disqualified two mills because our lab analysis proved their steel did not match their certs.
For heat treat we went to great lengths and depending on the type of steel we would use different HT processes. The most consistent I found was salt bath/submerged heat treating and there were only a few left in the country back in 2002.
Digital controls are great, except you could but a digital tach on a lawn mower, but it doesn't mean it will better control it. As to process control of heat treat most production heat treaters can not hold a tight enough cpk, but lets be honest to the application here, hand tools are going to have a range to the specified hardness and the specific regions of the tools that will apply to.
As to blanketly calling it marketing BS, I disagree, I would run die bushings and punches through there centerless grinding, OD grinding, CNC machining and they would look identical but some would be made from S2, S7, M2, M42, CPM10V, CPM15, A2, A10 along with some other more exotics. The only difference in the process besides what we ordered from our vendors was the heat treat and the speeds and feeds to the machining / grinding operations. Plus in a production environment changes like that are not a big issue or problem at all. The biggest challenge was making sure things were properly marked thoughout the process to eliminate mixing or incorrect heat treating.
Additionally there is liability to manufacturing tools that people could/can/do get hurt with, which means even a half *** **** house lawyer knows to send the broken tool to a lab for analysis and this would confirm what was used. There are many labs/companies out there that do forensic work using FEA techniques. Plus for instance if Sandvik thought someone was using their name and not buying their steel it wouldn't be hard to prove it, each batch of steel has it's own signature mix to it plus the company claiming that they used it would have to produce records proving they indeed purchased the quantity of steel.
Of course there are standards to the types of steels and more than once source may produce a given type, but even within that most manufactures keep pretty good records for lot tracability, especially those who sell to the US government. I don't think a supplier wants to sell a tool to the DOD or DOE and have a liability problem. I've worked for companies who supplied the government and can report that they will make you do what you are contractly obligated to provide, even at gun point.
At a few companies I worked at the government supplied the raw materials we used for some of the most demanding applications and they were delivered via armed courrier and returned to them the same way.
TheGrooveking
When I refer to digital control I'm not talking about a 1/4 din thermostat, FYI.
I'm talking about modern process control.
The heat treatment shops we used were extremely reliable, but maybe they had to be. We had to analyze on a part by part basis for some of the mechanisms we were building.
As far as certifications, I'm very familiar. We had to have custom forgings made on more than a few occasions, and a couple of those were from custom alloys because the metals we required for the project either have never been manufactured, or are no longer manufactured.
As far as being unable to discern similar alloys, that's fine... but you completely missed my point. IF any manufacturer was using any super secret alloy that had special properties (which I seriously doubt), or using heat treatment process that imbued that alloy with special properties, the marketing department would be all over it like flies on ****.
edit2: To clarify, I wouldn't expect someone at tech support for a high-end tool manufacturer to say anything other than the answer Teken was given... which means it could mean something, or absolutely nothing at all. It's just a generic response. Of course they aren't going to say tools that cost 3x as much use the same steel alloy but are better polished. That would plain piss people off.
IF they had some kind of special quality control from their metal supplier, they'd probably be happy to advertise that as well.
The reason they don't advertise anything like that, IMO, is because it probably does not exist. Some of the things you brought up above actually support my point.
