Who doesnt like comfort, ease and a task to be quickly achieved
? Well, times have certainly changed in the present with new inventions and discoveries. Science has taken up a next step and the engineers that are being produced by great institutions in todays date are the people responsible for this immense contribution to the field of science and technology. Who could have thought about doing a desired job in such a quick time, 100 years back? But the quick advancement of technologies pushed the boundaries even further and gave man more and more ideas to grow and give this world new expertise that is required for betterment.
The new devices that are launched in todays date have certainly had a impact on our lives and the systems introduced with the development of science have made life easier and simpler. Heat treatment is one such kind of a technology that has seen great advancement in a very short span of time. It is a method used to alter physical and chemical properties of a metal. It is used in the manufacture of various materials like glass and also in the manufacture of lot many alloys. It involves heating up of metals at a very high temperatures and also chilling them or cooling them depending upon the requirement. This helps in attaining the desired hardness or softness of the metal. This process involves various sub processes that are used in the manufacture of certain substances. They are:
1)Annealing
2)Hardening tempering
3)Precipitation hardening
4)Selective hardening
5)Case hardening
All these methods and process are the initial steps to get the desired product.
One of the most common materials where this treatment is done is steel. Steel is an alloy of carbon and iron where carbon plays the main alloying element and is responsible for the hardness of the steel. Iron on the other hand is the primary metal of steel and has various features like being stable at room temperature, has a shiny finish, is magnetic, has a high density and is ductile. All these factors are observed immediately. Steel further undergoes various other processes as mentioned earlier and the desired quality of steel is received.
The usage of heat treatment is now at an all time high. It is even used in the treatment of various ailments and diseases but the process obviously is totally different from the one used in metals.