The essence of high-speed tool steel is still tool steel, but the heat resistance is better.
Cemented carbide is a super-hard material made of tungsten carbide, titanium carbide and other materials. In terms of hardness and red hardness, high-speed tool steel ca n’t catch up. Although the name is “alloy”, it is actually one Kinds of cermets.
However, cemented carbide is more expensive. And it is too hard, and its processing has also become a problem. This makes it more difficult to make tools such as twist drills with more complex shapes using carbide.
For ordinary aluminum alloys, the hardness is very low, and ordinary tool steel can be effectively processed. However, cemented carbide is more wear-resistant, and the dimensional change of the tool during processing is very small, which results in the use of carbide tools in CNC machining .
On the other hand, the adhesion tendency of cemented carbide to aluminum is lower than that of tool steel, which can effectively improve the surface finish.
However, cemented carbide is relatively brittle, and attention should be paid during use.