Hardening of steel axles using lasers

Hardening of steel axles, using a 2.8 kW high-power diode laser. The surface hardening process relies upon a thermally induced phase change in iron alloys with significant carbon content. The appeal of transformation hardening by laser is the fact that one can direct the laser to harden only the regions desired - leaving the bulk material less brittle. The laser applies far less total heat than other thermal hardening and is almost instant as the part being hardened self-quenches.


The movie and associated information has been provided by Rofin-Baasel UK Ltd. for educational purposes, through the good offices of Andrew B. May. See http://www.rofin.co.uk for more detail.

See also, http://www.msm.cam.ac.uk/phase-trans for further educational resources, and

http://www.msm.cam.ac.uk/phase-trans/...

for specific information on martensitic transformations