Surface Engineering of Steels: Understanding Carburizing
Carburizing is the addition of carbon to the surface of low carbon steels. It is generally accomplished at temperatures between 850-1,000°C. Once quenched, the...
Heat Treatment of AISI 52100 For Bearing Applications
Bearings are crucial to our industrial life. They are found in virtually all industrial applications from wind bearings to aircraft engines. They are found...
Surface Engineering of Steels
The ASM Handbook defines surface engineering as: “treatment of the surface and near-surface regions of a material to allow the surface to perform...
Metallurgical Reasons for Grinding Cracks and Their Detection
Grinding is often a final machining step to achieve desired surface finish or final dimensions. Grinding is a high-energy process where a lot of...
Development of Residual Stresses During Machining and Workholding
There has been much discussion on the development of residual stresses and distortion during heat treatment. There is an entire conference series called “Quenching...
Applications of Hardenability
In the previous Hot Seat column, the concept of hardenability was discussed. It was determined that the sole contributor to hardness was carbon content,...
Factors That Affect Hardenability
Steel is a mixture of iron, carbon from 0.0 to 1.2 percent, and alloying elements. Carbon provides the hardness, and the alloying elements provide...
Evolution of Heat Treating Furnaces for Gears
It’s the mid ’70s, the phone rings, and I’m told that Ford wants to upgrade their heat treat equipment at the Rouge facility. Driving...
Thermochemical Surface Technologies Applicable to Gears
Hardening of the gear surfaces has a profound effect on their performance. Reduction in friction, enhancing rolling contact fatigue resistance, and other tribological properties...
Purchasing Tips
Purchasing an atmosphere or vacuum heat-treating system is much like purchasing a new car or a home — a lot of thought, research, and...
Energy Efficiency
“Hey, close the door — what do you think, we’re heating the neighborhood?” These are words I heard uttered by Mom and Dad over...
Workforce Development
How many times have we heard, “Our company is only as good as our people.” Yet more often than not, the majority of the...
Distortion Engineering of Gears
The causes for distortion of gears are complex and the heat treatment process has been named as a main contributing factor . However, the...
Surface Properties
Proper selection of steel and its heat treatment is a fundamental challenge for gear designers and manufacturers. However, performance and endurance limits of the teeth...
Deep Nitriding for Gear Applications and Their Partial Treatments
Stress conditions inside gear teeth are complex and require a careful examination by the designer before any specific surface treatment of the gears should...
Lean Manufacturing
The thermal processing industry is at a turning point. A point in which digital technology can manage process variables, enhance productivity, and optimize heat...
Modern Nitriding Techniques for Gear Applications
Improving surface properties of gears can be extremely beneficial since many failures start at the surface in the contact area between the teeth ....
Surface Engineering
Wear, corrosion, and fatigue failures are the most important mechanisms that lead to material degradation, which eventually causes failure of many gears. Those failures...
Controls Software in Atmosphere Equipment
An essential part of producing quality parts is achieving precise control over your processes and atmosphere equipment. As such, utilizing intuitive controls software with...
Convection Phase
Anyone who has attended a technical seminar on quenching has heard of the three stages of oil quenching: the vapor phase, the film boiling...
