Heat treating
Controlled thermal processing
Heat treating is the controlled heating and cooling of metal to alter its physical properties—typically hardness, strength, or ductility.
Steel is the most commonly heat-treated material.
Processes include annealing (softening), tempering (reducing brittleness), and quenching (rapid cooling for hardness).
The blade was heat treated to hold a sharper edge.
- furnaceEnclosed heat-producing structure
- steelCarbon-hardened iron alloy
- annealingHeat-softening of metals
- case hardeningStrengthening metal's outer layer
- carburizingSurface-hardening heat treatment
tempering · soak time · aerospace engineering · aluminum · normalizing · quenching · red hot · nitriding · salt bath · hot oil · iron · hardness · kiln · stress relief · titanium · construction materials · medical implants · copper
Heat treatinguntreated
Not given care
raw material · untempered · unannealed · green state · machining
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