Bristol Heat Treat has a customer that required their knife slides to be hardened and tempered for eventual application in the construction industry. They turned to us because of the expert furnace operators we have on staff, who are highly skilled in both hardening and tempering processes. Working with C1050 annealed steel, we used our continuous belt furnace, carefully monitoring all heating zone temperatures and belt speeds to produce the desired results called for by our customer’s specifications. Once the knife slides were properly hardened, quenched, and had passed Rockwell Hardness Testing (RC 48-52), they were tempered in the same furnace to improve their toughness. The knife slides, which ranged in size from 1” to 2” long, 1” to 2” wide, and ½” high, were visually inspected and left with their heat treatment finish. We now regularly harden and temper up to 70,000 knife slides for our construction industry customer in only three to five days.

If you are fabricating components like knife slides, which will have to survive in difficult environments, you already know that their hardness and durability are often compromised during the manufacturing process. To return their toughness through the proper application of heat treatment and tempering, you need a professional heat treating company, which means you need to contact Bristol Heat Treat.