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Old September 26, 2014, 11:55 AM   #26
schmellba99
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I'm still stuck on how something can be "steel" and not be magnetic?
Not all steels are magnetic, or at least are not magnetic enough to be readily handled with your common store bought magnets anyway.

Your low grade austenitic 300 series stainless steels (302, 303, 304, 304L) have slight magnetic properties - you can feel the magnetic attraction with a strong magnet, but it's overall a very weak attraction.

Your mid grade austenitic 300 series stainless steels (316, 321, etc.) have almost zero magnetic attraction.

Your 400 series are generally magnetically attracted (416, 440, 460), and most are martensitic steels.

Standard cast, wrought and forged iron are all highly magnetic. Steel is as well.
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Old September 28, 2014, 09:11 AM   #27
Elkins45
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Most stainless steels contain a fair amount of chromium: that's what makes them stainless. One of the consequences of adding all that chromium to the alloy is that it results in a crystallization pattern where the iron atoms are less able to arrange themselves into aligned magnetic domains.

As Unclenick said, with a strong enough magnetic field even the normally non magnetic alloys can be induced into behaving magnetically. Creating such a strong magnetic field generally requires an electromagnet with a fairly substantial current flow.

Semi related question: has anybody ever tried steel BBs as a tumbling medium? I know they did a good job cleaning the rust out of a steel outboard motor tank I had to fix up once.
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Old September 28, 2014, 10:05 AM   #28
F. Guffey
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Two Greek guys are walking toward each other, one ways "Was-up", the other replies "ISO, ISO". In English iso means same meaning the response by the second Greek guy was "Same-O, Same-O".

We use isochoric. isogenic and isobars then there is isometric.

Again, if the atoms are randomly arranged it is not a magnet, if there is something that holds it together allow the atoms to rotate and align when influenced by a magnet it can be picked up by the magnet. When the magnet is removed the atoms snap back to the random alignment and then is no longer a magnet.

There is nothing in a nonferrous metal that will allow the atom to rotate and align.

Steel BBs, steel BBs have carbon, when anything that causes rust is added the BBs will rust, the carbon in the BBs will allow the atoms to rotate and align in the presence of a magnet.

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Last edited by F. Guffey; September 28, 2014 at 10:09 AM. Reason: add non
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Old September 28, 2014, 08:14 PM   #29
Jim Watson
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There is a lot of funny terminology here.
I learned that "ferrous" meant "mostly iron" which the various grades of stainless steel certainly are.
The 304 and 316 stainless steel pipe and tubing I used in chemical engineering pilot plants are Austenitic, meaning that they contain enough nickel and chromium to screw up the domains and are not magnetic unless very particularly processed.
The 416R most common in firearms is a Martensitic alloy, definitely magnetic.

Carbon doesn't have much to do with magnetism.

Nickel, cobalt, and neodymium are ferromagnetic, but they are not ferrous.
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Old September 29, 2014, 10:06 AM   #30
F. Guffey
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Jim Watson There is a lot of funny terminology here.
Brilliant, simply brilliant, never fails, the subject of a magnet comes up and then!? someone chimes in and in a few words explains everything they know about a magnet.

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Old September 30, 2014, 09:44 AM   #31
Jim Watson
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How strange, I was just thinking that every time the term "stainless steel" comes up, someone explains in a few words that "it will rust" and "a magnet won't stick." The first of which is technically correct but seldom a real problem and the second is just not so, not with the grades of stainless most often used in guns.
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Old October 1, 2014, 02:01 AM   #32
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Shop vac.
Yup. That's what I'd do as well.
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