Work hardening, on purpose?
 

Hey!

I got this in a private email (won't give the person's name/mail, if
that was desired by the sender, sender would've posted to the group):

Have you looked into shot peening? They used that to
case harden early Subaru springs (this is per a documentry).
The process seems to be they drop a lot of tiny ball bearings on
the item to be treated. There is suppose to be some control
by varying the height the ball bearings are dropped.

I'm thinking something like a bead-blaster loaded with stainless beads
of some sort. Rail-gun, perhaps? :-) Could such a thing actually work?
Anyone else ever hear of this process?

--
To reply by mail, remove all lower case letters in my return address
).

Work hardening, on purpose?
 

The other Thomas Gardner wrote:

Hey!

I got this in a private email (won't give the person's name/mail, if
that was desired by the sender, sender would've posted to the group):


Have you looked into shot peening? They used that to
case harden early Subaru springs (this is per a documentry).
The process seems to be they drop a lot of tiny ball bearings on
the item to be treated. There is suppose to be some control
by varying the height the ball bearings are dropped.


I'm thinking something like a bead-blaster loaded with stainless beads
of some sort. Rail-gun, perhaps? :-) Could such a thing actually work?
Anyone else ever hear of this process?

Search for shot-peening on the web. It's not terribly uncommon (it's
the way-cool thing to have done to your performance crankshaft),
although the biggest advantage AFAIK is not work-hardening but strain
relief and grain compaction.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com