If you run a machine shop or your business needs high-tolerance parts, you may have to finish those parts to get them to the right specifications. Not everyone has the right finishing equipment for the job, and many companies find it easier to send their parts to a shop specializing in services like precision grinding. Here are some ways these services can benefit your business.
Metal Parts and Heat Treatment
Many parts these days need heat treatment. However, it’s necessary to do the heat treatment after the machining process. When metal gets heat-treated, it is often heated to high temperatures and then rapidly cooled or quenched. During the heating process, the metal expands and then it contracts when cooled. This expansion and contraction can cause some parts to change shape or size, and even though the amount of change is minuscule, it’s enough to affect close tolerance parts. So what can you do?
You can invest in very expensive precision grinding machines that operate on computer numeric control. However, this can be a problem because you may not have the capital for the investment. Also, if your shop is efficient, there might not be any extra space available for your new equipment. If this is the case, you can send the parts to a specialty shop for finishing.
There is another problem with heat treating metal. Metal is often heat-treated to make it harder and more durable. Yet, by hardening the metal, it can make it almost impossible to finish machining, but it’s possible to finish parts with highly precise grinding equipment.
Precision grinding is often used to put parts into tolerance after machining or heat treating. For instance, round and cylindrical parts can lose some of their roundness, and an experienced grinding shop can bring your parts to their needed specifications.
