Alloy
An alloy is a combination of two or more metals that are melted together. Alloys can often have desirable characteristics like increased strength or corrosion resistance.
Steel
[edit | edit source]Steel, a very widely used family of chemical compounds, unites the elements Iron and Carbon is considered an alloy, even though Carbon is not a medal.
Steelworkers can control the physical properties of a steel product by controlling the ratio of Iron and Carbon, and by several metallurgical techniques. with a few exceptions, like Mercury, almost all metals and alloys, are solid, at room temperature. Steel products, that are cooled slowly, are ductile, because they have large roundish crystals. Steelworkers can physically harden a steel product, through work hardening. Pounding or bending a piece of metal bends and breaks the crystals of which it is composed. Steel, and other metal and alloys, lose their ductility when the crystals it is made of are made smaller and of a more irregular shape.
Bronze and Brass
[edit | edit source]Elemental Copper a metal with a reddish-brown color, is relatively soft. Metalworkers discovered ways to make alloys of copper that were harder and more useful, when they discover they could alloy it with Tin or Zinc.