Alloying Elements

Typical Range s in Principal Effe cts

Alloy Ste e ls (%)
Aluminum <2 Aids nitriding
Restricts grain froth
Removes oxygen in steel melting
Sulfur <0.5 Adds machinability
Reduces weldability and ductility
Chromium 0.3 to 0.4 Increases resistance to corrosion and oxidation
Increases hardenability
Increases high-temperature strength
Can combine with carbon to form hard, wear-resistant microconstituents
Nickel 0.3 to 5 Promotes an austenitic structure
Increases hardenability
Increases toughness
Copper 0.2 to 0.5 Promotes tenacious oxide film to aid atmospheric corrosion resistance
Manganese 0.3 to 2 Increases hardenability
Promotes an austenitic structure
Combines with sulfur to reduce its adverse effects
Silicon 0.2 to 2.5 Removes oxygen in steel making
Improves toughness
Increases hardenability
Molybdenum 0.1 to 0.5 Promotes grain refinement
Increases hardenability
Improves high-temperature strength
Vanadium 0.1 to 0.3 Promotes grain refinement Increases hardenability
Will combine with carbon to form wear-resistant microconstituents
20
Continuous casting

Ladle carrying hot metal

Manufacturing Process of Steel– cont’d (Hot Rolling)
Process of hot rolling to obtain finished steel sections. In this
process, billets, blooms, and slabs, obtained from the basic
oxygen furnace, are reheated to virtual softening and rolled
to the required cross sections as shown.
 Section Shapes
Wide flange
W A992 I beam Channel
HP A572 G50 S A36 C, MC A36
M A36

Equal leg angle

Unequal leg angle
L A36
L A36

Tee Sheet piling Rail

24
Mamlouk/Zaniewski, Materials for Civil and Construction Engineers, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2017 Pearson Education, Inc.
Cold Rolling
• Sheet steel may be reduced by cold
rolling which
• Increases its tensile strength.
• Good surface finish.
• Coiled steel may be converted into light
gauge sections or profiled sheet. Cold-
rolled steel is used in construction and is
finished with zinc coating.
Classification of Steel Components
– cont’d

All components used in the structural frame of this building (columns, beams, and
joists) are made of hot-rolled steel sections, referred to as structural steel. The
floor deck is made of cold-formed steel.
Old method of producing steel
• Darby’s blast furnace (British Industrialist’s
innovation)
• Developed in 1709
• Raw materials: Coke and iron ore.
• Heating of raw material mix in blast furnace produced
liquid iron cast into sand beds (since troughs weren’t
available that time).
• These beds resemble piglets suckling on sow (female
pig)  Pig Iron
Casting of pig iron
• One way is to cast molten steel into ingots.
• Ingots are very large casting products, greater in size and shape
than blooms, billets and slabs.
• Ingot generally has rectangular/square cross section, but it is not necessary
that it should be uniform through out its length.
• Billets, slabs and blooms are formed by continuous rolling process
(Modern practice).
• Continuous casting is more energy efficient and produces better surface
finish.
X-sectional area < 36 in2 X-sectional area > 36 in2

Ingots (old technique)

Cast Iron
• Produced by melting of pig iron and steel scrap with coke in a cupola
furnace.
• Properties
• Carbon content : 2% to 4 % (purer than pig iron (4-5% carbon)).
• Melting point :1300 -1147oC lower than steels (about 1500oC)
• Inexpensive.
• Brittle  cannot be welded  cannot be hot worked.
• Because of its hardness, wear resistance, corrosion resistance and fire
resistance it is used in boiler castings, furniture, drainage systems,
manhole covers.
 Comparison
Property Cast Iron Wrought Iron Steel
Purest. Less than 0.25%
Composition Crude. 2-5% carbon 0.5 to 1.5% carbon
carbon
Structure Crystalline Fibrous, silky luster Granular
Specific Gravity 7 to 7.50 7.70 7.85
Melting point 1200°C 1500°C 1300 to 1400°C
Compressive 6.3 to 7.1 Compressive 6.3 to 2.0 Compressive 4.72 to 25.2
ton/cm2 ton/cm2 ton/cm2
Strength
Tensile 1.26 to 1.57 Tensile 3.15 to 3.94 Tensile 5.51 to 11.02
ton/cm2 ton/cm2 ton/cm2
Neither malleable nor Tough, malleable, ductile Tough, malleable and
Malleability ductility
ductile and moderately elastic ductile

Rusting Does not rust easily Rusts more than cast iron Rusts easily

Brittle, can not be welded
Forging and welding
or sheet rolled
Water pipes, sewers, drain
Uses pipes, lamp posts,
columns, railings
Civil Engineering Materials
Can be easily forged and Can be rapidly forged or
welded welded
• Reinforcement in RCC
Chains, crane hooks, and RBC
• Structural members
railway couplings,
components under constant • Fasteners: bolts, rivets,
shock sheets, files,
• Machine tools 34
 Making of Modern Steel – Sustainable
Steel Manufacturing (The Mini Mill)
• The mini-mill method relies on scrap recycling.
• A large scrap storage yard and a shredder are the two most important parts of a
recycling plant.
• After shredding, the scrap is separated into ferrous and nonferrous scrap using
magnetic separation.
• Nonferrous scrap is further separated into metals (copper, aluminum, etc.) and
nonmetals (plastics, rubber, fabric, etc.).
• After the scrap goes through shredding and separation, it is stored in the yard as feed
for the EAF.
• Most mini mills have a large scrap recycling facility within or close to the mill.