Today’s most valuable order came from an aluminum extrusion plant that placed a repeat order for high-toughness LG die steel, indicating that they have resolved the fracture issues with their fine-tooth cutters.
Mr. Li’s aluminum profile molds operate at a constant temperature of 500–530°C. Currently, he uses H13 steel, but the fine teeth are prone to chipping and misalignment. For radiator products with thin sections, H13 lacks sufficient strength and is prone to breakage. The mold requires a hardness of around HRC 55 to ensure adequate strength and prevent misalignment, while also maintaining good toughness—since a chipped mold is rendered useless. The mold manufacturer has tested H13, electroslag H13, 8418, and other mold steels, but all have failed—they keep breaking, and the issue remains unresolved.
After Mr. Li contacted me in April, given the specific operating conditions of his mold—which require consideration of both toughness and strength—I recommended the high-toughness LG mold steel. LG’s toughness is 8 to 9 times that of DC53, with a hardness of HRC 54–58. It’s so tough that it won’t break even if you bend it by hand. LG’s combination of high hardness and high toughness is something that low-carbon steels like H13 and 8418 simply cannot match.
After some discussion, Mr. Li purchased some LG die steel to test it out.
His product uses relatively few materials but has very high requirements—requirements that his competitors haven’t been able to meet. They’ve all been stuck choosing between H13 and 8418. He believed that if LG could solve the problem, there would be orders, so he wasn’t concerned about the cost—he just wanted it to work well. To support the client’s market development efforts, the product is currently under confidentiality, so I won’t be sharing any details with you.
The fact that the customer returned to place another order indicates that the mold issues have been resolved. This time, the purchase volume doubled, showing that LG not only solved the tooth chipping problem but also performed exceptionally well—otherwise, the customer wouldn’t have increased the order quantity.
Using LG die steel to address mold cracking is like stepping into a “liberated zone.” If your thin-sheet, narrow-flange aluminum extrusion molds are experiencing fracture issues, you should definitely give LG’s high-toughness mold steel a try.
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Wu Dejian’s tool steel, the chief of staff of the user, bought everything he had used.