Just that. Why is some steel stainless and some is not, what’s the difference actually?
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Steel is a type of alloy that will contain iron and carbon but can also contain other elements like chromium. It is the mix of elements but also how it cooled down that determines the properties.
The cheapest low-carbon steel will contain around 0.2% carbon the rest will be iron, there can be other stuff in it like silicon but it might only be 0.5%. So we talk about close to 100% iron
Stainless steel will contain a large percentage of other metals, like 16% chromium, 7% Nickel, 2% Manganese. Sp we talk about 75% iron and 25% other metal. The other metal will cost more than the iron so it will be more expensive.
There are other properties that can be different between different steel like how tough it is, and how hard it is to work with. Stainless will be harder to work with low carbon steel so it is not just the material cost that differs.
So different types of steel are selected both for cost and other properties like resistance to corrosion (stainless means high corrosion resistance), toughness, hot hard it is to work with etc. So stainless might not always be an alternative even if you do not care about cost.
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