The Benefits of Heat Treatment

The Benefits Heat Treatment

The benefits of Heat Treatment are harder and more durable metal. Rickard Specialty Metals and Engineer offer the service of heat treatment. Heat Treatment is the heating cooling of the metal to change their physical and mechanical properties.

The discovery of heat treatment made life more efficient. Being able to cut wood with a sharp saw that doesn’t lose edge or being able to cut other metals, form metals, and general create an unlimited number of implements from knives to kitchen pots. Heat treatment is a formidable discovery in the pantheon of human development.

In the modern day manufacturing environment Heat Treatment is a precisely controlled process of heating and cooling. Rickard Specialty Metals and Engineer is an authority in the process of heat-treating.

Taking a rudimentary point of view heat-treating a metal is about controlling the size of the grain structure. A smaller grain structure improves the mechanical properties, such as toughness, shear strength, and tensile strength.

The metal must be heated to the upper level of temperature stability. With the heat evenly saturated into the alloy, the process of controlled cooling can begin, or other process working techniques, like hot forming and forging have the same results as heat-treating. Many times with certain alloys, heat treatment and working the material are done in concert to get the desired effect, a tougher more durable alloy.

Annealing is a term that refers to the consistent heating of a metal to a specific temperature and then cooling at a rate and will refine the microstructure. The rate is slow. When you ask for annealed metal stock you are more often than not wanting to soften the metal for cold working, to improve machinability, or to enhance specific properties like electrical conductivity.

There are several different techniques we will discuss later such as aging, stress relieving, quenching, and tempering.

Careful consideration must be taken in selecting the right heat treating process. Rickard Specialty Metals and Engineering has a metallurgical engineer ready to professionally advise you.