Tool Steel H11 is a chromium-based steel alloy from the “H” family of steels according to the AISI classification system. H11 is one of the most commonly used alloys from this group, thanks to the outstanding impact toughness. Other steels from this group, such as the H13 have more vanadium, which gives better wear resistance and temper resistance, but worse impact toughness.
Thanks to these properties, Tool Steel H11 is mostly used in the aerospace industry, more precisely for the landing gear. This alloy is also widely used for helicopter rotor blades and shafts, as well as die-casting dies.
Tool Steel H11 is also used for hot tooling applications thanks to its excellent resistance to cracking, including thermal fatigue cracking, gross cracking and thermal shock during water cooling. These include hot punches, die casting dies, forging dies, hot shear blades, hot gripper dies, and extrusion tooling. Like most steels with high toughness and low carbon content, Steel H11 can be used for producing hot-work steels with the water-cooling method.
Tool Steel H11 has minimal distortion during deep-hardening and air-hardening thanks to the balanced alloy content. H11 can also be hardened with an air quenching method.
