time immemorial people have used the procedure of hardening of metal that was needed in his daily life.Whether it's cold steel or tools for agricultural work - all requiring high strength.Therefore, people have become necessary in the process of this invention, in which metal would become stronger and harder, and its ductility is lowered.And a method for processing metal products was found.Hardening of steel - such is his name.To acquire the necessary qualities of the metal during quenching undergoes heating and subsequent cooling.
When there was stainless steel, the need to improve the methods and ways in which the treated metal.Heat treatment and did began to develop in new ways, so that today hardened steel (stainless) enables the production of new materials of higher quality.
martensitic stainless steel is the type of steel, which is used mainly in the hardening process.Its normal state - increased hardness, but it differs in that is prone to the appearance of fragility.Application of heat treatment with a quick release helps to increase the viscosity that characterizes this type of steel as one of the most sought-after metal.
Working with rustproof the following types of hardening - a global view of where the product is fully heated, and local, where applicable partial hardening of the areas that are needed.In addition, such a process as hardened steel, different cooling techniques.It depends on what brand from stainless steel.Mostly used for this purpose oil and alkali salts.And water as the cooling medium is rarely used.
Depending on what kind of product form, but also make the metal applied thereto, and various methods for tempering steel.There are step-isothermal hardening and tempering with autotempered.
main parameters of the process are heat (temperature) and cooling (speed).Moreover, the speed with which the steel is cooled by being heated to the desired temperature, will affect the results of the quenching.The main technical problem is the selection of an optimum temperature in view of the fact that in case of overheating, stainless steel may lose hydrocarbon, thereby reducing its strength.In order to avoid residual stress in the inner structure of the hardened metal products, to apply additional mechanical processing methods.For example, the gradual cooling, which will be a gradual decrease in temperature.This method is good for producing quenching the workpieces, which are intended to produce a heavy-duty tool.
There is also surface hardening steel.It does not take much time, in contrast to chemical-thermal processing, which allows to automate the process.In this way, the implementation process will require the production of its hardening inductor and selection of their treatment regimen for each individual part.Surface hardening is suitable for production of parts of one type (mass production), for example, in the automotive industry.
Thus, to achieve high quality metal product, which would have a combination of strength, toughness and ductility required proportions to be applied to HARDWARE unique process called "tempering steel."Although stainless steel is one of the best modern materials, however, the technology that allows to improve its quality, has come to us from ancient times.
