Induction Annealing - UltraFlex Power Technologies

Induction Annealing is an advanced heat treatment process that involves heating materials above their recrystallization temperature. This method aims to achieve and maintain the desired temperature for a specific period, followed by controlled cooling. Widely used in metallurgy and materials science, induction annealing enhances the workability of materials by reducing hardness and increasing ductility, allowing them to undergo shape changes without breaking.

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Advantages of Induction Heating in Annealing

Induction heating provides superior control over the annealing process. By precisely regulating the heating power, repeatable and accurate heating profiles can be easily achieved. Unlike conventional methods, induction heating directly heats the workpiece using a magnetic field, resulting in a faster and more responsive process. Additionally, the high efficiency of induction heating is particularly beneficial for lengthy treatments, reducing energy consumption and operational costs.

Benefits of Induction Annealing

Compared to traditional annealing methods, induction annealing offers several significant advantages:

• Precision and Control: The ability to fine-tune the heating process ensures consistent and uniform treatment of materials.
• Speed and Efficiency: Direct heating via a magnetic field allows for quicker response times and reduced processing durations.
• Clean and Contactless Process: Induction annealing is a non-contact method, which means it is cleaner and easier to automate, leading to higher-quality finished products.
• Versatility: This method is suitable for a wide range of materials, from ferrous metals to non-ferrous metals like copper and silver.

Applications of Induction Annealing

Induction annealing is used in various industries, including automotive, aerospace, and manufacturing, to improve the mechanical properties of components. It is ideal for processes that require precise temperature control and consistency, such as:

Induction Forging in a way is a type of annealing where you heat the metal to a particular temperature just before melting it for shaping it into a desired shape, like a screw head or a bolt.  If you don’t anneal the material to the required temperature, the material may crack as you try to form it. You may not see the crack visually, but it will be there on a micro-scalar level.

Titanium Ti-6AL-4V type material for Forging: If you wish to heat a Titanium slug or a billet at high Temperatures into a desired shape, you may have to blow Argon on the slug during the heating process to minimize the unwanted alpha form – scaling – that can develop across the surface of the material during the heating process. For more details, see Vacuum Annealing below.

Another example of trying to form metal without heating is using a Forming Die to Forge metal. If you try that without heating it to the required temperature first, you will ruin your die.  

One of our customers in the aerospace industry does a lot of annealing/forging in order to build parts for aerospace and for bridges. In their case, the material is titanium and non-magnetic stainless steel, which they first anneal, i.e. soften, and then forge into fasteners in their proprietary shape.

Annealing is also used for softening a portion of a metal, for instance Brass, to soften it for an application such as Crimping.

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The SA80 also features an Auto Learn function, which allows the system to remember and recall all of your internal recipes (power/time/temperature) for each part that you anneal.  Together with the Auto Tune feature, the SA80 allows you to easily create and reliably replicate your successful, repeatable and consistent results time after time.

The Auto Learn feature is particularly useful when you want to use the same induction heater to anneal parts of different materials.  We can often provide a one- or two-coil solution, which, combined with Auto Learn, enables our customers to use the same induction generator with different coils.  For fast turnaround on part changes, simply switch coils and recall the correct part settings from the easy-to-use interface.

Some materials don’t react to well to oxygen during the annealing process. The material oxidizes due to its specific properties. For instance, some nickel-based materials, such as 200 series super alloys, have to be heated to target temps of about to degrees F for annealing. When you heat them to this high a temperature, they develop ugly tarnishing and scaling. There are a few ways to handle this: 

1) Blow argon toward the material to purge oxygen before beginning the annealing process. For instance, place your wire material inside a quartz tube, blow argon into the area to purge oxygen, then heat the material to the target temperature;

2) Anneal the material in a vacuum chamber.  

Materials that would benefit from vacuum annealing include materials such as Stainless Steel 3 or 4L, 316L, 17-4PH types. 

We can design and manufacture a complete manual, semi-automatic, or fully automatic vacuum annealing solution to fit your needs. The solution doesn’t need to be complicated – to keep things simple, in an open-air environment, place your workpiece in a quartz tube, wrap an induction coil around the tube, and you’re ready to start annealing.

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