Metallurgical conditions

TUBEXACT owns a heat treatment unit and can deliver with following metallurgical conditions:
Hard, ¼ hard, ½ hard, ¾ hard, 4/4 hard, annealed / overhardened.

There are different ways to harden the metal :
- The first method consists in mixing to the metal one or several elements, generally metallic ones, to obtain alloys.
- The second method starts from pure metal or alloy and consists in hardening it or cold-drawing. This is a rule for all metals and alloys. The more a metal is drawn, the more it will be hardened, until it breaks. When a metal is drawn, thus hard, it looses its flexibility, its ability to bend out. In order to give flexibility back and to soften, the tube has to be heated up and annealed in a furnace. The metal becomes annealed.
Depeding on elongation ratio and work hardening, the annealed metal will become harder when cold-drawn, until it cannot accept elongation any more. Between these two metallurgical conditions, there are several intermediate hard-drawn conditions..