09/06/2026
COMP Cams’ recent posts on camshaft and tool steels drew considerable interest. Hopefully, this chart helps explain the tradeoffs an engineering team must consider when selecting a steel grade.
When we make a genuine “anything you can do, I can do better” jump in steel capability, the raw material price tends to double. The scale below is logarithmic: each arrow step to the right roughly doubles the price! Heat treatment alone can then cost as much as the material itself, before machining costs are even considered.
This does not make the less expensive steels inferior. EVERY steel shown here is awesome at something, especially for its price. Grades such as 5150, 5160, 8620, and 9310 remain popular because they provide remarkable performance without requiring exotic material prices.
The goal is never to purchase the most expensive steel. It is to select the least expensive steel that is excellent at the actual job, then specify and control the cleanliness, heat treatment, and complete manufacturing process required to let it perform.
These are approximate low-volume prices. Actual cost varies tremendously with product form, size, quantity, availability, cleanliness, and melt practice. Valve spring wire also includes considerably more processing and inspection than ordinary bar or billet.
