Flame Hardening Mild Steel

In this article i m going to discuss different ways to harden mild steel.

Flame hardening mild steel.

Start with mild steel that isn t really mild steel tip. Does any body know anything about flame hardening mild steel if so how good is it for small parts of valve gear on 5 g models. The process of flame hardening. Flame hardening is performed on parts made of mild steels alloy steels medium carbon steels and cast iron.

Flame hardening steel involves heating the steel and then cooling it. So they say it s impossible to harden mild steel. This first part of the process changes the molecular structure of the steel and makes it hard but brittle. It is a surface hardening process in which a thin surface section of a component of hardenable steel is heated rapidly by direct application of high tempe rature flame to a temperature above its upper critical temperature i e it is austenitized and then the component is quickly quenched in water or oil transforming austenite to mar tensite while the.

The metals are heated to temperatures to their austenization temperature causing the surface to change while the core remains unchanged and soft. There are various ways to harden mild steel that doesn t require industrial techniques. 1013 forum posts 143 photos. As its name suggests flame hardening uses direct heat from oxy gas flames.

Make sure your working area is well ventilated. Hi stan you can only case harden mild steel. Pure steel is actually too soft for many applications. Well here s how to do it.

In order to put a hard layer on the steel carbon must be fused at the molecular level into the top centimeter or so of the steel. Hold the steel directly in the flame. Hardening steel with motor oil is a way of performing what is called the case hardening of steel. It can be case hardened however which just means using a chemical treatment with heat to add a thin layer of tough material around the soft steel core.

If dropped or struck hard it could actually shatter the second part of the process known as annealing involves reheating the steel and. One way to do this is to make the. To harden steel start by heating the metal directly with a blow torch until it. Therefore taking safety precautions are a must.