The Definitive Guide to Inconel 718 Metal Stamping: Processes & Applications

Inconel 718 is a high-performance nickel-chromium superalloy. It stands out for its amazing strength and ability to resist corrosion at very high temperatures.

The process of creating inconel 718 metal stampings plays a vital role in making long-lasting, essential components for many industries. Working with this material brings many challenges that require special knowledge, similar to what's needed for inconel 625 stamping. This guide covers the material's properties, how it's stamped, what makes it difficult to work with, and where it's used.

A Unique Challenge

Stamping Inconel 718 differs greatly from working with regular metals. The material's basic properties make it complex to work with. You need to understand these features to make parts successfully.

The Inconel family of superalloys is known for working well in tough conditions, and Inconel 718 shows this clearly.

• High Yield & Tensile Strength: When properly heat-treated, Inconel 718 has a tensile strength around 1375-1400 MPa. This means you need much stronger presses and tools that can handle huge forces.

• Exceptional Work-Hardening Rate: The material quickly becomes harder as it's shaped during stamping. This puts extreme stress on tools and dies, making them wear out faster.

• High-Temperature Resistance: While this helps in its final use, the material's ability to stay strong at high temperatures creates a lot of heat during forming. This heat can break down lubricants and shorten tool life.

• Corrosion Resistance: This quality makes Inconel 718 essential in harsh chemical and marine settings, which is why it's often used for stamped parts.

Technical Stamping Process

Successfully forming Inconel 718 requires careful planning to deal with the material's difficult nature. Every step matters, from designing tools to choosing the right lubricant.

Tooling and Materials

Regular tool steels won't work for Inconel 718. Dies must be made from very strong, wear-resistant materials like advanced tool steels (D2, M4) or, more often, include carbide inserts at points that wear quickly.

Tool design needs smooth curves and highly polished surfaces to reduce friction, prevent sticking, and help the material flow smoothly during forming.

Press Selection

Heavy-duty mechanical or hydraulic presses are essential. The high forces needed to cut and shape Inconel 718 require presses with high tonnage capacity and very rigid frames to minimize bending under pressure.

Servo-driven presses offer better control over speed and timing, which helps manage heat and improve part quality.

Critical Lubrication

Lubrication might be the most important part of the process. Regular lubricants will fail almost immediately.

From our experience, poor lubrication often causes failures in inconel 718 stamping operations. Success depends on using high-pressure lubricants, such as heavy-duty chlorinated or sulfurized oils, or applying advanced dry-film lubricant coatings to the metal before stamping.

These lubricants create a strong barrier that keeps the Inconel from sticking to the die surface under extreme pressure and heat.

Post-Stamping Operations

Parts made from Inconel 718 are usually stamped when the metal is in a softer state. After forming, they need heat treatment—solution annealing followed by age-hardening—to develop their full strength.

Overcoming Top Challenges

Preparing for and solving common problems is key to a stable and cost-effective inconel 718 stamping process. The material's structure changes significantly during forming, leading to predictable issues.

Challenge	Root Cause	Proven Solution
Severe Tool Wear & Breakage	Extreme work hardening and abrasion from nickel alloy.	Use of premium carbide tooling, apply PVD/CVD coatings (TiN, TiAlN) to tool surfaces, and reduce press speed to manage heat.
Unpredictable Springback	High elastic modulus and strength of the material.	Incorporate over-bending into the die design, add coining or setting stations, or use servo-presses for precise stroke control at bottom-dead-center.
Galling & Poor Surface Finish	Material adhesion to the tool surface under high pressure.	Polish tool surfaces to a mirror finish (SPI A1/A2), use specialized high-pressure lubricants, and maintain precise die clearances.

Inconel 718 vs. 625

While both are top nickel alloys, Inconel 718 and Inconel 625 have key differences that affect which one to choose for stamping. Inconel 625 stamping has its own challenges, though they differ somewhat from 718.

Material properties defined by leading material science organizations like ASM International guide the choice between these two alloys.

Feature	Inconel 718	Inconel 625
Primary Strength	Age-hardenable, superior mechanical strength and hardness.	Solid-solution strengthened, superior corrosion and oxidation resistance.
Formability	More difficult; exhibits a higher work-hardening rate.	More ductile and generally more formable than 718.
Tooling Stress	Extremely High	High, but typically lower than that experienced with 718.
Typical Application	High-stress structural parts (e.g., turbine discs, fasteners).	Corrosion-facing parts (e.g., chemical processing vessels, bellows).

While Inconel 718 is chosen for its ultimate strength, projects requiring a balance of strength and exceptional corrosion resistance often utilize Inconel 625.

Applications & Case Study

The unique properties of Inconel 718 make its stamped components essential in industries where failure is not an option.

• Aerospace & Defense: Jet engine components, turbine seals, high-pressure fasteners, and heat shields.
• Energy & Power Generation: Gas turbine parts, nuclear reactor hardware, and high-temperature bolting.
• Chemical Processing: High-stress valves, pumps, and fittings exposed to corrosive media at elevated temperatures.

Case Study: Aerospace Bracket

A client needed a lightweight, strong engine bracket to work under extreme stress and heat. The part was originally made through expensive and slow CNC machining from a solid block.

We created a solution using a multi-stage progressive die inconel 718 stamping process. The operation used carbide-insert tooling in an 800-ton servo press, combined with a special dry-film lubricant.

The result was a finished part produced much faster and at much lower cost. The stamping process also created a beneficial grain flow, making the component last longer than the machined version.

By mastering the complexities of this superalloy, we deliver robust, reliable, and cost-effective components for the world's most demanding applications.