Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment Processes
17 September 2024
Heat treatment is essential for the targeted influencing of important material and surface properties, for example to soften a part, to harden its surface or to anneal stresses.
All of these processes involve precise temperature control in order to obtain the desired properties and guarantee their quality. Detailed documentation and process control of the temperatures is required, especially for safety relevant components in the automotive and aerospace industries.Depending on the desired heat treatment process, non-contact temperature measurement is essential for accurate process control, monitoring and data capturing. Either a point temperature measurement, using a spot pyrometer, a line scanner, providing a continuous temperature profile or a full thermal image, taken by a thermal imager, are available for reliable and repeatable temperature process control.
Here are some heat treatment processes that require accurate temperature measurements for process control, monitoring and data capturing.
HEAT TREATMENT PROCESSES AND SOLUTIONS:
Induction Heating and Case Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesA highly versatile technique, induction heat treatment is widely used and is extremely fast at heating ferrous metals and is commonly used in a variety of heat treatment processes.
This method allows for precise, localized heating without the need for an open flame. It is a non-contact technique that enables rapid and partial heating, reduces processing time, and minimises any distortion or damage to the surrounding areas.
Case hardening, also known as surface hardening, is a process in which the surface layer of a material is hardened while maintaining a softer core. This is often used to increase wear resistance. Methods of case hardening include carburizing, nitriding, and induction hardening. Temperature measurement is taken online and directly controls the process by providing live temperatures to the control system.
Recommended Solutions: NIR-656/2K, MWIR-640, SPOT+R100, SPOT+R160
Flame Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesFlame hardening is a process of case surface where the parts get heated up by a natural gas flame to about 900-1100 °C and then get quenched and hardened in an emulsion.
Usually the parts are moved or rotated and as the surface of the part is heated to a certain temperature, the part is dipped into a cooling bath of emulsion/water.
In stationary processes – e. g. – gear hardening – the part surface heated by the gas flames, will be cooled down by spray of emulsion to reach the hardening effect.
Recommended Solutions: SPOT+ M100, NIR-656/2K
Dip Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesIn dip heat treatment and hardening processes the heated parts exiting the annealing holding furnace will be entered into a bath of emulsion.
With this the parts get cooled down to certain temperatures to stop the grid transformation process. Those processes are usually provided to whole bigger parts being heat treated.
With the furnace, reheat temperature the temperatures and temperature distributions after existing the cooling bath are essential for the part and process quality and need to be monitored and documented.
Recommended Solutions: LWIR-640, MWIR-640, SPOT+M3-5, SPOT+ M390, SPOT+ M210
Laser Surface Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesLaser hardening is another case hardening process similar to induction or flame hardening. The advantages of the process are the high speed, the ability to precisely reach even very small areas and surfaces, and the fact that no quenching media such as water, emulsion or air are required, since the partially heated surface cools just as quickly through heat conduction in the component and prevents unwanted structural changes.
Thermal imagers and pyrometers are used working at a different wavelength from the laser emission together with laser cutting filters providing a full view of the process.
Special solutions could integrate the spot pyrometer into the optical pass of the laser head.
Recommended Solutions: MWIR-640, SPOT+ M100, SPOT+ M390, SPOT+ M3-5
Press Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesPress-hardening saves process steps, time and money and is used all over the automotive or aerospace industry and their suppliers. During this process the 900 °C hot steel sheets exiting the reheat furnace and are provided directly to the forming press.
During this process the sheets are formed to their desired shape and at the same step get cooled and hardened. This hardening process is closely temperature controlled and enables different hardness levels per area.
Thermal imagers and line scanners provide a full thermal profile of the sheets exiting the reheating furnace and the press mold before starting the press process. As the finished part leaves the process, its temperature is checked by additional thermal imagers to control and document the cooling and hardening processes.
Recommended Solutions: MWIR-640, LWIR-640, LSP-HD, NIR-656/2K
Annealing & Reheating
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesReheat furnaces are tightly controlled as the material travels through the furnace and gets heated or annealed entirely to the designated temperatures. Reheat furnaces might also include pre-heat, heating and soaking zones before the stock is being discharged for further processing.
During the pre-heating and heating/annealing processes in-furnace thermal monitoring and temperature measurement are beneficial to prevent the stock from being heated too quickly, particularly in the pre-heat zone and to control the furnace process efficiency and decrease the energy and emissions.
Recommended Solutions: NIR-B-656/2K, MWIR-B-640, SPOT+ M390
Continuous Annealing (CAL)
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesContinuous horizontal of vertical annealing lines (CAL) remove cold rolling stress by annealing followed by heat treatment to produce finished strip with the required hardness and strength properties.
Several heating and cooled steps are presented to the strip moving though the furnace, taking the strip through a tightly controlled heating and cooling temperature profile designed specifically for each product, which is critical to achieve desired properties.
Accurate temperature measurement at each zone is essential for process and quality control mostly with hot furnace background available and being compensated for online.
For the downstream galvanization process, the SPOT+ GS advanced application pyrometer is available accurately measuring the strip temperature in different galvanizing and galvannealing steps, including liquid zinc coated strip surfaces.
Recommended Solutions: SPOT+MM, SPOT+ M160, LSP-HD, SPOT+ GS
Plasma Hardening
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesIn plasma hardening (nitriding and nitrocarburizing) processes nitrogen is purposely diffused into the surface zone of ferrous alloys in an ionized gas atmosphere to produce functional surfaces like tools, drills, pump shafts, helical gears, medical devices and implants to reach a higher surface hardness and to decrease the effects of abrasive, adhesive and corrosive wear
The process temperatures need to be controlled continuously around 400-700°C to ensure this process is correctly performed to ensure the high product qualities SWIR pyrometer spectral responses are required to provide accurate temperature reading and process control through the plasma.
Recommended Solutions: MWIR-640, SPOT+ M160
PROCESS CONTROL & MONITORING:
Autonomous Operation Options (Fixed Pyrometers)
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesSPOT+ smart pyrometers provide the temperature within milliseconds at the spot of their field of view.
Using the internal webserver and on-board I/O features, the SPOT+ pyrometer can directly be used for process control, providing online temperature measurement and alarming within the instrument without the need of any additional software.
Advanced communication features, such as Modbus TCP, EtherNet/IP or Rest API allow to easily implement multiple SPOT+ pyrometers into new or existing processes, fully remotely accessible.
Recommended Solution: SPOT+ Pyrometer Series
Autonomous Operation Options (Thermal Cameras)
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesAMETEK Land’s thermal LWIR/MWIR-640 imagers implement a webserver and on-board I/O’s for remote and autonomous operation providing 4 -20 mA outputs, relay outputs and digital inputs.
These can be easily setup and used for direct process control and remote monitoring.
Recommended Solution:LWIR-640, MWIR-640
Autonomous Operation Options (Linescanners)
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesThe LSP-HD scanner heads are designed for an autonomous operation to directly control connected I/O-modules configured by the LSPro Configuration software. Having configured the system, the head and I/O module are working fully autonomous, providing temperatures, controls and alarms for up to 14 freely configurable zones of the 1000 sample line scan profile.
Recommended Solution: LSP-HD Linescanner
Software Controlled Operation Options
Advanced Temperature Measurement in Heat Treatment ProcessesThe IMAGEPro advanced thermal imaging and process control software supports up to 16 imagers and SPOT+ pyrometers for process control, monitoring and data capturing.
Combining thermal imagers and pyrometers with this software in a measuring system allows widely expanded process control and monitoring features, including customised configured data-capturing opportunities.
This is particularly important and essential for safety-relevant components, e.g. from the automotive or aerospace sectors.
For multi-scanner solutions and advanced process monitoring and control, the WCA – Windows Analyse and Control Software is available for any LSP-HD line scanner applications. It allows a customised system and process control layout aligned to the process needs and data capturing requirements.
Up to 8 scanners can be implemented in one WCA instance for full process control, monitoring and extended data-capturing options.
Recommended Solution: LWIR-640, MWIR-640, LSP-HD Linescanner, SPOT+ Series
SERVICE CALIBRATION & CERTIFICATIONS:
AMECare Overview
At AMETEK Land, we pride ourselves on our comprehensive range of non-contact temperature measurement instruments that lead the industry in accuracy, repeatability and reliability.
We understand the vital role instruments play in optimising your process and ensuring you produce the highest quality products. Any unscheduled downtime or data quality issues can severely impact your ability to run the plant efficiently. Our AMECare® Service Contracts are specifically designed to ensure your instruments are professionally maintained and calibrated to operate at peak factory performance levels throughout their lifetime.
AMETEK Land has built extensive facilities around the world—these include a UKAS (United Kingdom Accreditation Service) accredited calibration facility in the UK, an ANAB (ANSI National Accreditation Board) traceable laboratory in the USA and a NABL (National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories) facility in India, with service centres for in-house product support. The AMETEK Land calibration laboratories in the UK, USA and India are approved to the international standard ISO 17025.
All new and serviced instruments are certified, following testing and calibration against national standards, and conform to the published specifications. This gives measurement history from day one, which is often a requirement within quality systems. UKAS, ANAB and NABL Certification (ISO17025) is also available showing individual difference from specification and uncertainty of measurement for most temperature measuring instruments.
To learn more about our temperature measurement solutions for Heat Treatment processes, click here to get in touch.
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