Cold air can affect your steel. Specifically, it can make it brittle, which can lead to Thermal Cracking. Steel that is ductile at room temperature may also lose that in colder temperatures so instead of bending, it may break.

If you plan to work with a steel in exceedingly cold temperatures, look into a wear resistant steel that can combat thermal cracking.

How To Test For Steel Reaction To Cold

One way to test how a steel will react to colder temperatures is the Charpy V-Notch Impact test. This test measures the amount of energy absorbed by steel during a fracture. The energy absorbed gives a measurement of toughness and helps determine the brittle transition temperature.

Energy or load is measured in feet/pounds at a specified temperature i.e. -20°C. This will confirm that the steel will be able to stand up in the temperature specified by the test.

ENDURA’s Wear Resistant Steel

ENDURA steel performs very well in cold temperatures. It exceeds 32 ft/lb. at -40°C, which is impressive when compared to AR 400 at 20 ft/lbs. AR 500 cannot meet any of the standard Impact tests as it is very brittle even at room temperature.

If you require a wear resistant steel that performs in cold temperatures, then ENDURA steel should be your steel of choice. Contact us for more information about wear resistant steel.