Is it brass or is it bronze ?
The copper alloys comprise
four main families of brasses: copper-tin-zinc alloys (red, semi-red and yellow brasses):
"manganese bronze" alloys (high
strength
yellow brasses); leaded "manganese bronze" alloys ( leaded high strength yellow brasses);
and copper-zink-silicon alloys (
silicon brasses and bronzes.) Ingot for remelting for the
manufacture of castings molded in foundry's like Barr Casting Inc. may
vary slightly
from the ranges shown.
Bronzes-
Broadly speaking, bronzes are copper alloys in which the major alloying
element is not zinc or nickel. Originally "bronze" described alloys
with tin, are the only principal alloying element. Today the
term is generally used not by itself but with a modifying adjective.
For wrought al-loys,
(workabal) there are
four main families of
bronzes: copper-tin-lead-phos-phorus alloys (leaded
phosphor bronze); copper-aluminum alloys (aluminum bronzes); and
copper-silicon alloys (silicon
bronzes).
The cast alloys
have four main families of bronzes; copper-tin-lead alloys (leaded and
high leaded tin bronzes) copper-tin-nickel alloys (nickel-tin
bronzes) and copper-aluminum alloys (aluminum bronzes).
The family of
alloys known as "man-ganese bronzes", in which zinc is the major
alloying element, is included in the brasses, above.
Copper-Nickels
--- These are alloys with nickel as the principal alloy element.
Source COPPER DEVELOPMENT ASSOCIATION INC.