Steven, that's kind of a funny story for me .International Nickel Co developed ,in the 1960s , a group of alloys called Mar-Aging steels. It's really not proper to call them steels as carbon content is very low and doesn't play much part in the properties.
It is based on using martensite and aging for strengthening . A non-carbon martensite to get toughness without being brittle.other elements that provide precipitates for additional strength.
The composition of 18 % Nickel 250 was - 18 % Ni, 7.8 % Co, 4.8 % Mo, 0.4% Ti for a 250,000 psi yield strength.
I was still in school when this was happening and chose an alloy for my thesis, substituting Mn for much of the Ni
.So there I was induction melting my alloy, banging away with a nice power hammer , heat treating etc .I had a ball !! as all the stuff on paper was then transformed to the real world !
Saddest part ? no photos of me at work .I'd gladly pay high amounts for that today !
The best was putting theory to practice . In the mean time I intensely studied the alloys ,met metallurgists from Inco and other companies .
I went in adifferent direction after school and lost contact with Maraging steels. Until one day I thought 'what ever happened to Maraging ?' Googled and to my surprize found lots of enteries but almost all were golf club heads and fencing blades ??? Confusion as I went from developing an alloy system to golf and fencing ! I can tell you we were not thinking of golf or fencing back in the 1960s ! I was a activeepee fencer for many years
To explain martensite - while we usually think of carbon -iron martensite there are other types. Our Titanium sword man ,Mecha, uses such an alloy for his swords. Most say Ti doesn't make a hard enough alloy that's because they don't use alloys containing martensite !
I really wanted photos ofme and the hammer but they were afraid to go to the basement and watch the weird metallurgist !
