Why do we heat treat tool steel?

Without proper heat treatment, tool steel will not serve its' intended purpose. It will be too soft to withstand the forces applied to it during most manufacturing processes. Most tool steel is supplied to the toolmaker in the annealed or soft condition. In the soft condition, tool steel does not offer any usefulness to the end-user. It is provided in the annealed condition in order to facilitate ease of machining by the toolmaker. In the annealed condition, tool steel has a high degree of toughness, however, it has insufficient hardness to withstand the rigors of any of the common manufacturing processes. It also lacks sufficient wear resistance for these applications.

 Most tooling applications required that the tooling has a high degree of hardness in order to withstand the pressure that will be applied to it in the manufacturing application. During the manufacturing process, the tools are exposed to many repeated cycles, wether it is metal stamping, plastic molding, rollforming or powder metal compaction, wear resistance is required to resist erosion of the tool.

For the complete heat treating procedure, including tempering charts, tips and tool steel data sheets, see our "Tool Steel Simplified" book.

You can find all of the answers to your tool steel questions in our comprehensive book "Tool Steel Simplified". This concise book includes tool steel properties, alloying elements, uses, careers, data sheets, heat treating and so much more. It is written is an easy-to-understand format for designers, engineers, buyers, students, production planners and anyone that is interested in learning more about tool steel.

You have questions and you want answers. The answers to your tool steel questions are found in “Tool Steel Simplified”. You will receive 226 pages of valuable tool steel information providing you with the resources necessary to produce high-quality tooling for your application. Click here to get your copy

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