What is the difference between mild steel and chrome moly?
A common misconception is that chrome moly is lighter than mild steel. Given the same o.d. and wall thickness a chrome moly tube weighs the same as a mild steel tube. Chrome moly is the abbreviation for “chromium molybdenum”, and it is an alloy steel. It was designed for and is used extensively in the aircraft industry due to it’s high tensile strength and torsional load ratings.
Because of it’s higher strength (almost double that of mild steel), it is possible to use thinner gauge tubing when building a product which provides for less weight, or a product that is the same weight but nearly twice as strong. On our products chrome moly tubing is offered for increased strength and/or lighter overall weight for extreme applications. Another misconception is that chrome moly will “crack” and not have long term durability.
The stories you may hear about this normally boil down to one thing, it was not properly welded. We have extensive experience in TIG welding chrome moly using industry standard practices and have never had any durability issues.