A heat treatment process that employs the existing carbon content in a steel part to increase its hardness from its surface down to its core. Through-hardening is effective on steels with 30 points or more of carbon. Low-carbon steels cannot through-hardened, but can be case-hardened instead. Through-hardened materials tend to be harder but more brittle than case-hardened ones, and this can be a drawback in bending dies which require toughness rather than extreme hardness. Compare case-hardening.
FREE Tube-Bending Guide Download:
A complete guide to the principles of the 4-Step set-up for tube-bending tools
This is a printable handbook showing how to implement in four standardized steps the “forward mandrel” set-up for rotary-draw tube-bending machines and establish process control over the so-called black art. The procedure is based upon the guiding principle that the tools make the bend and takes advantage of the inserted design of modern mandrel tooling.