Some progress has been made recently in developing mathematical expressions which can be used to forecast the mechanical properties of low-alloy low-carbon steels from their composition and heat treatment conditions. Thermokinetic diagrams have been processed statistically to derive formulas which correlate the critical cooling rates for bainitic, ferritic and pearlitic transformation, chemical composition and austenitization conditions with the hardness of the martensite, bainite and ferrite-pearlite structure. In this work the strength characteristics of low-carbon low-alloy steels (hardness, static tensile strength, yield point, etc. ) are described as an exponential function of the cooling rate.