Heat treating furnace

Efficient and reliable Heat Treating Solutions with top-class performance

Heat Treating

Definition

Heat treating is a group of industrial, thermal and metalworking processes used to alter the physical, and sometimes chemical, properties of a material. The most common application is metallurgical.

How does Heat Treating work?

Heat treating involves the use of heating or chilling, normally to extreme temperatures, to achieve the desired result such as hardening or softening of a material. Heat treatment techniques include annealing, hardening, tempering, normalizing, and quenching.

Although the term heat treating applies only to processes where the heating and cooling are done for the specific purpose of altering properties intentionally, heating and cooling often occur incidentally during other manufacturing processes such as hot forming or welding.

Processes and Applications

We have a wide experience supplying both continuous and batch heat treat furnaces/ovens, including austenitizing, tempering, annealing and stress relieving furnaces for the steel forging, casting and fabrication industries. Complete automatic handling systems can be included.

Austenitizing

NUTEC Bickley is renowned worldwide as a leading innovator and manufacturer of austenitizing heat treating furnaces, available in custom designs and dimensions to match customer production and process requirements. This heat treatment process of steel and other ferrous alloys consists of heating materials above their critical temperatures long enough for transformations to take place. If an austenitized material is followed by a quenching process, then this material becomes hardened. Quenching is performed at a rate that is fast enough to transform the austenite into martensite.

Quenching

NUTEC Bickley is an industrial quenching equipment manufacturer, among other products for the metals industry, in custom designs and dimensions to match customer production and process requirements. We can include high velocity agitation, heating and cooling options.

Tempering

NUTEC Bickley is renowned worldwide as a leading innovator and manufacturer of tempering heat treating furnaces. Tempering is a heat treatment technique applied to ferrous alloys, such as steel or cast iron, to achieve greater toughness by decreasing the hardness of the alloy. Tempering is usually performed after quenching. Tempering is accomplished by controlled heating of the quenched work-piece to a temperature below its lower critical temperature.

Stress Relief

NUTEC Bickley is renowned worldwide as a leading innovator and manufacturer of stress relief heat treating furnaces. Stress Relieving is the treatment of a metal or alloy by heating to a predetermined temperature below its lower transformation temperature followed by cooling in air. The primary purpose is to relieve stresses that have been absorbed by the metal from processes such as forming, straightening, machining, rolling or welding,

Advantages of solution heat treating furnaces

The purpose is to provide enough thermal energy to dissolve, in a solid solution, the alloy elements present. Without getting into the solid state physics of the metallurgical reactions, dissolution does occur but only at this high temperature. However, if you slowly cool down the part, the copper wants to come back out of solution.
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Here is where the important step of quenching takes place. Quenching is a very rapid cool-down, usually using water, at a rate of 260°C to 315°C (500°F to 600°F) per second. Quenching locks in place all alloy elements that have been dissolved at the high solution heat treat temperature. Before the alloy additions can think about changing places and moving back out of solution, they are locked in place by the rapid quench cool-down. The result is called a ‘supersaturated solid solution’, an unstable condition. Quenching is critical to proper solution heat treatment.

The main purpose of aluminum heat treatments is to increase the strength and hardness of a specific subset of aluminum alloys, namely the wrought and cast alloys that are precipitation hardenable.
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For a certain period after quenching, aluminum alloys are softer and easier to form, following which age hardening occurs.
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The solution heat treatment process improves mechanical properties.

Furnaces we manufacture for Solution Heat Treatment

Some typical operations might incorporate our roller hearth or basketless carousel furnaces/ovens. Where solution treatment is needed, we can fabricate custom designed water and air quench systems. Solution heat treating furnaces manufacturers generally take place up to a maximum temperature of 600°C (1,110°F), and for aging around 260°C (500°F).

Box furnaces - ovens

We provide box furnaces and ovens for temperatures ranging from 150°C to 1,340°C (300ºF to 2,450ºF) to perform a wide variety of process applications.

Drop bottom furnaces

We supply drop bottom quench furnaces to complete the solution and T6 heat treatment furnace manufacturers in a batch configuration.

Roller hearth furnaces

Roller hearth furnaces and ovens are designed for batch process applications, and for indexing–continuous production.

Advantages of Nutec Bickley systems

Nutec Bickley supplies aluminum alloy solution heat treating furnaces featuring the latest technology. Some of the main features are:

Gas-fired heating system (direct or indirect fired)

Electrically heated with low density Incoloy sheathed element

Best soft/low storage insulation available

High velocity air recirculation system with stainless steel baffles

Electromechanical or hydraulic hoist system

Temperature uniformity as good as ±3°C (±5°F)

The quench delay can be as low as five seconds from the time the door begins to open, and our quench tanks are supplied with a high agitation system (water or polyalkylene glycol quenchant)

State-of-the-art instrumentation and control is available on all our furnaces and ovens

Our systems conform to the AMS2750, AMS2770, AMS2771 and AMS2772 aerospace standards and are also in compliance with ASTM B917/B917M and B918/B918M standards

An optional PAG (polyalkylene glycol) management system can be provided

Our heat treating furnaces are built with heavy duty and stable steel frame and refractory construction.

Best insulation combination available

State-of-the-art instrumentation and control is available

Best pulse firing combustion system to allow excellent temperature uniformity and improved fuel consumption is available

Heat recovery combustion equipment is optionally available for heat treating furnaces

Learn more about the different industrial heat treatment furnaces we offer

Products for aluminum
Box furnaces 
Drop Bottom furnaces 
Aging ovens 
Roller hearth ovens and furnaces Car bottom furnaces, etc.

Products for steel
‍Box furnaces 
Car bottom furnaces 
Tip-up furnaces 
Roller hearth furnaces Bell furnaces, etc.

Related Industries

At NUTEC Bickley we are committed to engineering and design excellence and to delivering the very best equipment to our customers. We assure this by analyzing all of our customers’ needs and complying with rigorous quality standards.

Forging

NUTEC Bickley provides heat treating Forging furnaces for the heating and reheating of large steel ingots, blooms and cast parts.

Learn more about Forging

Steel & Aluminum

NUTEC Bickley is an international leader in the design, manufacture and installation of innovative energy efficient systems for the Steel and Aluminum industry

Learn more about Steel & Aluminum

Related Resources

Metals Industry - Industrial Furnaces

(E-book)

Date Added: 02/14/2023

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Frequently asked questions about our heat treating furnaces

What is the process of heat treating a furnace?

Heat treating involves the use of heating or chilling, normally to extreme temperatures, to achieve the desired result such as hardening or softening of a material.

This is Nutec Bickley

Providing Thermal Equipment Solutions that go beyond expectations

We serve multiple industries through the design, building and installation of combustion systems, thermal insulation and highly specialized industrial furnaces, kilns and ovens. We are focused on understanding our customers’ needs and supplying the best equipment at the most competitive price.

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Aluminum Heat Treatment

Industry leading manufacturer, specializing in rotary forging, metal spinning, and the flow forming of aluminum and other alloys into complex shapes.

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