Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their inter-metallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are known as alloys.
Stainless steel, also known as inox, corrosion-resistant steel (CRES) and rustless steel, is an alloy of iron that is resistant to rusting and corrosion. It contains at least 10.5% chromium and usually nickel, as well as 0.2 to 2.11% carbon. Stainless steel's resistance to corrosion results from the chromium, which forms a passive film that can protect the material and self-heal in the presence of oxygen.
Beryllium copper (BeCu), also known as copper beryllium (CuBe), beryllium bronze, and spring copper, is a copper alloy with 0.5–3% beryllium. Copper beryllium alloys are often used because of their high strength and good conductivity of both heat and electricity. It is used for its ductility, weldability in metalworking, and machining properties. It has many specialized applications in tools for hazardous environments, musical instruments, precision measurement devices, bullets, and some uses in the field of aerospace. Beryllium copper and other beryllium alloys are harmful carcinogens that present a toxic inhalation hazard during manufacturing.
Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer or a die. Forging is often classified according to the temperature at which it is performed: cold forging, warm forging, or hot forging. For the latter two, the metal is heated, usually in a forge. Forged parts can range in weight from less than a kilogram to hundreds of metric tons. Forging has been done by smiths for millennia; the traditional products were kitchenware, hardware, hand tools, edged weapons, cymbals, and jewellery.
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. Heat treatments are also used in the manufacture of many other materials, such as glass. Heat treatment 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, case hardening, precipitation strengthening, tempering, carburizing, normalizing and quenching. Although the term heat treatment 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.
Carbon steel is a steel with carbon content from about 0.05 up to 2.1 percent by weight. The definition of carbon steel from the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) states:
Extrusion is a process used to create objects of a fixed cross-sectional profile by pushing material through a die of the desired cross-section. Its two main advantages over other manufacturing processes are its ability to create very complex cross-sections; and to work materials that are brittle, because the material encounters only compressive and shear stresses. It also creates excellent surface finish and gives considerable freedom of form in the design process.
Maraging steels are steels that are known for possessing superior strength and toughness without losing ductility. Aging refers to the extended heat-treatment process. These steels are a special class of very-low-carbon ultra-high-strength steels that derive their strength not from carbon, but from precipitation of intermetallic compounds. The principal alloying element is 15 to 25 wt% nickel. Secondary alloying elements, which include cobalt, molybdenum and titanium, are added to produce intermetallic precipitates. Original development was carried out on 20 and 25 wt% Ni steels to which small additions of aluminium, titanium, and niobium were made; a rise in the price of cobalt in the late 1970s led to the development of cobalt-free maraging steels.
Sheet metal is metal formed into thin, flat pieces, usually by an industrial process.
Case-hardening or Carburization is the process of introducing carbon to the surface of a low carbon iron or much more commonly low carbon steel object in order to enable the surface to be hardened.
In metallurgy and materials science, annealing is a heat treatment that alters the physical and sometimes chemical properties of a material to increase its ductility and reduce its hardness, making it more workable. It involves heating a material above its recrystallization temperature, maintaining a suitable temperature for an appropriate amount of time and then cooling.
Magnesium alloys are mixtures of magnesium with other metals, often aluminium, zinc, manganese, silicon, copper, rare earths and zirconium. Magnesium alloys have a hexagonal lattice structure, which affects the fundamental properties of these alloys. Plastic deformation of the hexagonal lattice is more complicated than in cubic latticed metals like aluminium, copper and steel; therefore, magnesium alloys are typically used as cast alloys, but research of wrought alloys has been more extensive since 2003. Cast magnesium alloys are used for many components of modern automobiles and have been used in some high-performance vehicles; die-cast magnesium is also used for camera bodies and components in lenses.
6061 aluminium alloy is a precipitation-hardened aluminium alloy, containing magnesium and silicon as its major alloying elements. Originally called "Alloy 61S", it was developed in 1935. It has good mechanical properties, exhibits good weldability, and is very commonly extruded. It is one of the most common alloys of aluminium for general-purpose use.
AerMet alloy is an ultra-high strength type of martensitic alloy steel. The main alloying elements are cobalt and nickel, but chromium, molybdenum and carbon are also added. Its exceptional properties are hardness, tensile strength, fracture toughness and ductility. Aermet is weldable with no preheating needed. AerMet alloy is not corrosion resistant, so it must be sealed if used in a moist environment. AerMet is a registered trademark of Carpenter Technology Corporation.
Microalloyed steel is a type of alloy steel that contains small amounts of alloying elements, including niobium, vanadium, titanium, molybdenum, zirconium, boron, and rare-earth metals. They are used to refine the grain microstructure or facilitate precipitation hardening.
Mangalloy, also called manganese steel or Hadfield steel, is an alloy steel containing an average of around 13% manganese. Mangalloy is known for its high impact strength and resistance to abrasion once in its work-hardened state.
Hot metal gas forming (HMGF) is a method of die forming in which a metal tube is heated to a pliable state, near to but below its melting point, then pressurized internally by a gas in order to form the tube outward into the shape defined by an enclosing die cavity. The high temperatures allow the metal to elongate, or stretch, to much greater degrees without rupture than are possible in previously utilized cold and warm forming methods. In addition, the metal can be formed into finer details and requires less overall forming force than traditional methods.
Caldie is a chromium-molybdenum-vanadium alloyed tool steel manufactured by Uddeholms AB. It is intended for cold work processes, such as blanking and piercing, applied to difficult materials such as advanced high strength steel, where compressive strength and chipping and cracking resistance are important.
Boron steel refers to steel alloyed with a small amount of boron, usually less than 1%. The addition of boron to steel greatly increases the hardenability of the resulting alloy.
Hot Form Quench (HFQ®) - a lightweighting technology - is an industrial forming process for the production of deep drawn, precise and complex geometry ultra-high strength aluminium sheet components. It is the aluminium hot stamping process for age-hardening grades of sheet and has similarities to the press hardening of ultra-high strength steels. HFQ, the original aluminium hot stamping process, exploits viscoplasticity of aluminium at high temperatures to facilitate the production of lightweight structures, often replacing steel, composites, castings, extrusions or multiple cold formed pressings.
