PURPOSE: To develop the title wire for a dot printer capable of being easily drawn and having excellent corrosion resistance and toughness by repeatedly solution-annealing and drawing an Fe-Mn-Cr alloy having a specified composition into a wire, and then plasma-carbonitriding the wire in an atmospheric gas under specified conditions.

CONSTITUTION: An alloy steel contg., by weight, 0.05W0.35% C, 0.2W1.0% Si, 10.0W28.0% Mn, 10.0W18.0% Cr, 0.02W0.4% N, <0.045% P, and <0.02% S and wherein the Cr equivalents prescribed by (Cr+1.5Si) is controlled to 10W20% and the Ni equivalents prescribed by [Ni+30(C+N)+0.5Mn] is controlled to 17W30% is repeatedly solution-annealed and drawn to obtain a thin wire having about 0.3mm diameter. The wire is carbonitrided in the atmosphere of a gaseous mixture of a rare gas, H2, a hydrocarbon, and N2 [the volume ratio of hydrocarbon/(rare gas + gaseous H2 + gaseous N2) is controlled to 0.05W4%] kept at 0.5W15Torr and 750W1,250°C to produce a wire for a dot printer at a low cost.