Steels made to be hardened and used to shape, cut or form other materials: cold-work steels for punches and trimming dies, hot-work steels for forging and die-casting dies, and plastic mould steels for injection moulds. They are sold in small tonnages but at many times the price of carbon steel, cut to the block size a toolmaker needs.
Also called
Tool steel
Die steel
Mould steel
Mold steel
Cold work steel
Hot work steel
Plastic mould steel
D2
H13
P20
1.2379
1.2344
1.2311
1.2738
AR
صلب العدد والقوالب
ZH
工具钢和模具钢
DE
Werkzeugstahl
FR
Acier à outils et pour moules
ES
Acero para herramientas y moldes
IT
Acciaio per utensili e stampi
TR
Takım ve kalıp çeliği
RU
Инструментальная и штамповая сталь
Main formsForged and rolled flats and blocks, round bars, pre-machined plates, pre-hardened mould blocks
Typical sizesFlats 10–600 mm thick; rounds 10–500 mm; mould blocks to 1,000 mm and more
Main standardsISO 4957, ASTM A681, ASTM A686, JIS G4404, JIS G4401, GB/T 1299
Tool steels are carbon and alloy steels made to be hardened — usually to 50–62 HRC — and to keep that hardness, toughness and dimensional stability in use. They are grouped by the job: cold-work steels (water-, oil- and air-hardening, and the high-carbon high-chromium D types) for cutting and forming at room temperature; hot-work steels (the chromium-molybdenum-vanadium H types) for dies that touch hot metal; shock-resisting S types for chisels and punches; and plastic mould steels, usually supplied pre-hardened, for moulds that are machined and polished rather than hardened afterwards. High-speed steels are the fifth group and have a page of their own.
They are melted in small electric furnaces, often remelted by electroslag (ESR) or vacuum arc to make them cleaner and more uniform, forged rather than only rolled to break up carbides, and annealed soft for machining. A toolmaker machines the annealed block, the heat treater hardens and tempers it, and the tool is ground or polished to finish. Pre-hardened mould steels such as P20 and 1.2738 are delivered at about 30–36 HRC so that the mould can be cut directly.
The Werkstoff numbers of German practice — 1.2379, 1.2344, 1.2311 — are the names most of the market uses, with the AISI letters (D2, H13, P20) beside them. The two systems are close but not identical, so a buyer should name the one the design was made in.
Demand in the GCC comes from aluminium extrusion and die-casting plants, plastics and packaging moulders, forging and fastener shops and the oil-tool industry. The region does not melt tool steel; stockists in the UAE and Saudi Arabia import from European, Asian and Indian producers and saw blocks to size.
Forms & sizes
Tool steel is sold by the kilogram for the block cut, so a stockist quotes on exact dimensions plus a machining allowance. A sawn block is oversize; a pre-machined (milled or ground) plate is supplied close to finished thickness.
Flats and blocks
Forged or rolled, sawn to size, black or pre-machined on six faces
Round bars
Black, peeled or turned, for punches, ejectors and round dies
Pre-hardened mould blocks
P20 / 1.2311, 1.2738 and similar at about 280–340 HB, for direct machining
Precision ground flat stock
Ground to tight thickness tolerance in standard widths and 500–1,000 mm lengths
Delivery condition
Soft annealed (about 230–250 HB) unless pre-hardened is ordered
Steel Mills - Agents & Traders · Coil Service Center · Stockist - Distributor · Fabrication · Jeddah
