Metal Glossary

Designed to be a quick reference guide for customers, the Cashmores glossary provides definitions of the latest metal industry terms.

Metal Glossary

Designed to be a quick reference guide for customers, the Cashmores glossary provides definitions of the latest metal industry terms.
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  • Upper Critical Strain
    The minimum amount of cold work needed prior to annealing or solution treatment to produce a fine recrystallized equiaxed grain structure by eliminating the cold worked structure of elongated grains.
  • Vickers Hardness
    Brinell Hardness, Hardness, Rockwell Hardness
    The resistance of a metal to plastic deformation usually by indentation using a diamond or a hardened steel ball. There are various recongnised hardness scales including Vickers (VPN), Brinell and Rockwell. N.B. The empirical, but robust, relationship between hardness and tensile properties that applies in steels does not apply, and the steel tables must not be used for aluminium and its alloys. A less rigorous relationship has been established for some aluminium alloys but it is not widely used.
  • Water Staining
    A residue left on aluminium that has been wet and allowed to dry naturally. This is very difficult to remove and cannot be improved by polishing or anodising.
  • Weld Decay
    This describes the condition of a stainless steel that, having been welded or otherwise thermally processed, now has chromium carbide particles present in the grain boundaries. In this condition the steel becomes susceptible to corrosion as the matrix areas around the carbide are depleted in chromium and cannot form the protective oxide film.
  • Whitworth Thread, BSP, BSP Thread
    British Standard Pipe Thread, also called Whitworth Thread, with 14 threads per inch.
  • Work Hardening
    Strain Hardening
    The increase in strength and hardness with a general loss of ductility that results from cold working of a work-piece.
    Related Terms: Cold Working
  • Wrought Product
    A product made by hot, or hot and cold, plastic deformation by the rolling, extruding or forging of a cast product.
  • Yield Strength, Yield Point
    The tensile load above which a material ceases to behave elastically and will undergo permanent deformation. Measured in Newtons per square mm (Nmm-2) or Mega-Pascals (MPa).
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