Heat treatment

Heat treating is a group of industrial and metal working processes overused to alter the physical, and sometimes chemical, properties of a material. The most common application is metallurgical. Heat treatments services are also used in the manufacturing of other materials, such as glass. Heat treatment involves the use of heating or chilling, normally to extreme temperatures, to achieve a desired result such as hardening or softening of a material. Heat treatment techniques include annealing , case hardening, precipitation strengthening, annealing and quenching. It is noteworthy that while the term heat treatment applies only to processes where the heating and cooling are done for the specific purpose or altering properties intentionally, heating and cooling often occurs incidentally when other manufacturing processes are constantly forming or welding.