Читать книгу Welding For Dummies - Steven Robert Farnsworth - Страница 18

Stainless steel is amazing stuff. It has a lot of the good qualities that regular steel has (see the preceding section), but it also offers one added bonus: It resists corrosion (rust, for example) like a champ. You can put a piece of stainless steel out in the yard and let it get rained on for six weeks, and when you bring it back inside it probably won’t have a single spot of rust on it. Incredible!

How does stainless steel provide such remarkable resistance to corrosion? Its alloy contains 10 to 30 percent chromium (the rest is iron, although sometimes other metals, such as nickel, are also added to the alloy).

You can weld stainless steel with all three of the major types of arc welding (stick, mig, and tig). It’s a great choice if you want your project to resist rusting or to have hygienic surfaces (those that don’t harbor bacteria and other microscopic critters).

Stainless steel is pretty expensive compared to other commonly welded metals, so be prepared to open your wallet a little wider if you choose stainless steel for a welding project.