Has the quality of HSS changed over the years?

When I bought a new Myford lathe in 1980 I bought with it a set of Eclipse HSS lathe tools. These tools were of excellent quality and worked really well, I still occasionally use the few that haven't been ground down to nothing over the years. They held their edge for a long time between sharpening.

Similarly the Eclipse HSS tool blanks used to grind up into all sorts of tools had similar good wear properties. Step forward to today and I find that any of the pre formed HSS lathe tools are of very poor quality and do not hold their edge for long. As for the HSS blanks, they seem only useful as makeshift parallels.

I have just finished a job that involved countersinking 900 holes in plain Carbon Steel. Because of the nature of the job I thought it best to order a couple of good quality Countersinks, they lasted for no more than about a dozen holes each. In desperation I resorted to using an old Dormer twist drill carefully shortened and ground with a 90 degree point, this lasted for all the remaining 800 and odd holes without the need for a resharpen. I guarantee that if I had tried to use one of my fancy coated drills it would likely have either shattered or worn out in record time.

Drills are, in my opinion even worse than the lathe tools, I have one set that just wilt when I try to drill anything other than the softest material, favourite method of failure is for the tips of the flanks to break and the drill body diameter wears to a reduced diameter for the depth of the hole, rendering the drill useless for any further work.

Am I the only person who seems to be finding this to be the case

No not really but what people want to pay for them has

Spend a couple of quid on a no brand HSS bit and you get what you pay for. Go and spend £20+ on an Eclipse blade and it will be better

Same with drills get a cheap set and suffer or spend £100 on a decent set and they will be better.

Yes, I have found to avoid the no-name cheap HSS and buy the more expensive brand name stuff. Best toolbits i have though are the old one fished out of the bottom of my old apprentice toolbox that sat in my Dad's shed for 25 years.

Another factor is the psychology of ageing. We older chaps believe everything was better in the past.

Of course the world was a much sweeter place in our youth because we were young. Life was full of opportunities, we were fit and healthy and enjoying interesting work experiences. We were innovators at an exciting time, sweeping legions of old farts out of the way, and making the world a better place.

Now I'm a wobbly pensioner. My ability to influence events is much reduced and people keep changing things I used to understand. Keeping up is scary and it's a comfort to retreat back to the "Good Old Days". My mum can't cope with Internet banking or online shopping, and she's convinced that the old fashioned British High Street provided a much better service. (They didn't.) I'm looking at technologies like Social Media that I've no interest in engaging with. I too am being left behind and I don't like it.

Somehow as we age, we rose-tint the past as well. We forget queues, SAE's, 'can't get the parts guv', health hazards, unreliable cars, strikes, failing industries, inflation, the cheap rubbish we bought, dirt, pollution, poverty and above all the high cost of products compared with our incomes.

Back to HSS. In truth, the quality of steel has ALWAYS been variable. If you read late 19th Century copies of Engineer you will find many complaints about steels: 'the plates shattered like glass' etc.

Bob may have a good point though. HSS isn't one unique type of steel. Rather the description covers a number of different alloys containing high proportions of expensive metals like Chromium, Tungsten and Cobalt.

Depending on the alloy, some HSS is harder than others, and some types resist heat better. As Jason says cost matters: hobbyists tend to buy at the cheap end of the market because the best tools are expensive. It's also possible that high-end HSS lathe tooling is harder to find today because industry don't use it much. Carbide inserts out-perform HSS in most industrial applications and are cheaper to boot.

Life is much more complicated than "everything was better in the past", or "brand-name 'x' guarantees quality", or "British-made was always high quality", or "Chinese-made is always rubbish."

Dave

I have 4 Eclipse carbon steel lathe tools that give excellent results if used with caution

Roy

Buy brand name British or American.

Just as good today as 50 years ago. Use the 5% added what-its-name (Cobalt).

Say 2.5" of 1/4" sq is double the price from Cromwells than say a "hobby supplier". That's a fiver instead of £2.50. It's a hell of a lot better than 100% price difference.

As somebody mentioned earlier, you get what you pay for...

Edited By thaiguzzi on 10/03/2017 13:37:59

Nice description of getting old and nostalgia in GB Dave

We need to be wary of imported tools called HSS as there are those who claim HSS is a manufacturer and not​ High Speed Steel ; possibly done to mislead folks. Also there are different grades of High Speed Steel but it is rarely clear from adverts exactly what we are getting although the price gives a clue. Decent HSS makes excellent cutting tools. During my toolmaking days HSS tools were used to machine HSS in its soft state to make milling and other cutters at a suitable speed. Colin

Certainly a buyer beware job for quality. I don't think I will ever have to buy any more HSS blanks in my lifetime, I have boxes of the stuff from 30 or 40 years ago nearly all with some sort of form ground on and kept "Just in Case".

Drills are however a different story, I tend to buy the HSS + Cobalt if I remember and most of the branded stuff lasts well. I did buy a couple of metric sets from 1 to 10 MM x 0.10 increments both Guring brand and nearly every drill required grinding to make it cut. Not what you expect at their prices.

I wanted some round HSS to make some taper reamers for some injector cones. I found some 6mm dia x 100mm lengths cheaply on eBay (from China) and they came quite quickly. I ground up a couple and then found, on withdrawing a reamer after reaming the embryo cone, that it came out all twisted. Hardly what you expect to happen - snapping off in the hole, yes - but can you get hold of one of your Eclipse bits and put a 90 degree twist in it???

So yes, you get what you pay for...perhaps you have to harden them yourself...

I have a few pieces of Stellite left, the cutting edge lasts a very long time, but then, it takes all day to grind them.

As for HSS, the same applies to hacksaw blades.

When I was young..ooh arr..a gen-u-wine Eclipse hacksaw blade lasted for months.

I recently decided to splash out and buy a pack of Eclipse 32 tpi blades because the China-cheapies did not last long, now I find that the Eclipse cutting edge goes almost as quick as the China-cheapies, and I am only cutting brass rod.

I don't think that Eclipse bother themselves to set, grind, harden and temper the teeth anymore.

.

I find hi speed from the Far East to be inconsistent at best. It helps if you only purchase material that has a specification on it, ie 'M2' or 'T15'. Branded tool bits are good too. Personally, I like Chicago Latrobe, V.R. Wesson, and Cleveland myself, but I'm just an old Yank. I have a couple of pieces made by Eclipse, and they are very good, but not so available over here.

opochka, Are you buying the bi-metal flexible type of hacksaw blades ? I find these are dreadful things and barely last to cut a 1/2" tensile bolt. I have gone back to using "Allhard" blades, last batch from Bahco. In a decent frame they last very well and don't break as easily as some folk think they will.

Yes, i have the bi-metal types.

I thought that they would flex themselves better, to avoid binding up when cutting the brass rods, but this

actually seems to make them wander off the straight cut line a bit more, so I will be going back to the standard ones.

.

I concur the flexible blades are the work of the devil to try and cut something straight. Allhard just work.

You want to buy the HSS toos made with cobolt and vanadium tool steel. The higher the cobolt the longer the tool life. I have seen it as high as 9%, but mostly these days it is in the 5% range.

Neil

Most of the new stuff seems to come from the Far East and is often unmarked. You can still get decent hi spec stuff from places like Cromwell tools but I don't know for how much longer as the range of available sizes seems to be diminishing. Well worth keeping a look out as the last stuff I got from Cromwell was 10% Cobalt and on offer.

I also prefer all hard blades and a decent frame makes all the difference to blade life and accuracy of cut, bimetal do have their place though, an all hard blade cutting conduit in a pipe bender vice will have a very short life.

Mike