What are some materials that don't bend as easily as stainless steel?

Question

With better or equal tensile strength, too.

Answer 1

Which grade of stainless is it?

If you have 304 or 316 you could try 410 or 420 which are stronger.

Instead of changing the material to one with a higher yield strength you could also change the section you are using - instead of a solid bar or even a tube an I section is stiffer due to second moment of area.

Answer 2

Are you looking for a material with a higher yield point, higher stiffness, or higher specific stiffness? And compared to what type of stainless? What's the application? I could attempt a brain dump of what I know about materials to see if any of it meets your needs, but why don't you ask a more specific question instead?

Edit:

If the rods are becoming permanently deformed, you may just need a harder steel. Depending on where you're buying, 3/16" drill rod might be the easiest material to get. Be aware that hardened steel can be very hard to cut.

If you need a material with less elastic deflection, that's going to be tough.  You'll need to get into something exotic, such as beryllium (warning: toxic) or tungsten.  It's probably easier to use a larger rod (or tube) or a different configuration.

Answer 3

Martensite steel. Cool austenite steel as rapidly as possible. While it has very high tensile strength, do note that it has very low ductility - which means it won't bend much, but rather break like glass if you put beyond the maximum load

Answer 4

DIAMOND PLATE!

Answer 5

Tungsten would be one possibility but you need to be more specific to get a tailored answer.