Stainless steel has this uncanny ability of showing its strength in the most ordinary, often mundane, situations such as how it was first discovered in 1913 by the British metallurgist Harry Brearley.
Quoting from Readers' Digest's How Is It Done? Brearley was experimenting with steel alloys – combinations of metals – that would be suitable for making gun barrels. A few months later he noticed that while most of his rejected specimens had rusted, one containing 14 percent chromium had not. The discovery led to the development of stainless steel.
Ordinary steel rusts because it reacts easily with oxygen in the air to produce crumbly red iron oxides. Other metals, such as aluminum, nickel and chromium, also react in much the same way, but their oxides form an impermeable surface layer, stopping oxygen reacting with the metal underneath. With Brearley's steel, the chromium formed such a film, protecting the metal from further attack.
Sanyo Seiki Stainless Steel Corporation is the largest manufacturer of stainless steel in the Philippines. It supplies various grades for the top-of-the-line machines and equipment in the plants of other big companies that are engaged in food processing, health and pharmaceutical manufacturing, and electronics. Visit www.sanyoseiki.com
