On Thu, 6 Nov 2008 11:12:09 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:


"Dan " Dan@ wrote in message ...
Is this the same steel they use to build bridge beams out of? I was
somewhere that had the bridge beams rusted purposely so they don't
have to paint them. It was either Duluth, or San Diego. How's that for
getting old? Can't remember where.

Yeah, that's the kind of application that Cor-Ten was made for. It came out
in the late '70s, IIRC, when I was covering materials for _American
Machinist_, and it was being promoted for all sorts of structural and
decorative uses.

The Cor-Ten tradename covers a number of weathering steels. The first,
Cor-Ten A (ASTM A242), dates back to the 50's. By the time I was
taking my structural courses in the early 70's Cor-Ten B (ASTM A588)
had obsoleted the earlier material. It was pretty common by that time,
if you knew what to look for.

There's at least one more specification for sheet -- the stuff above
refers to structural shapes.

--
Ned Simmons