Quality Control Measures
1. Spectrometer Analysis
- Purpose: To analyze the composition of steel using a spectrometer to ensure it meets the required standards, avoiding potential mold failures due to inferior material.
- Control: Ensuring the contents of carbon, chromium, molybdenum, and other elements fall within the specified range to ensure the steel's hardness, wear resistance, and corrosion resistance.
- Importance: Different types of mold steels have strict requirements for chemical composition. Precise spectrometer analysis helps avoid performance instability caused by composition deviations.
2. Metallographic Testing
- Purpose: To examine the internal structure of steel, evaluating the grain size, microstructure, and potential microscopic defects.
- Control: Steel samples are cut, polished, and chemically etched to observe the metallographic structure under a microscope. Grain size, precipitated phases, and hardened layers are analyzed to ensure uniform internal structure without defects.
- Importance: Metallographic testing helps confirm that the steel has undergone appropriate heat treatment, ensuring its mechanical properties and service life.
3. Ultrasonic Testing (UT)
- Purpose: To detect internal defects in the steel, such as air pockets, inclusions, cracks, etc., using ultrasonic waves.
- Control: High-frequency sound waves are transmitted through the steel, and the reflected waves are received to determine if there are any hidden defects in the material.
- Importance: UT testing can effectively identify internal defects that are difficult to detect with the naked eye, ensuring the structural integrity and reliability of the steel during actual use.
4. Visual Inspection
- Purpose: To ensure the surface of the mold steel is free from obvious defects, avoiding potential damage during processing and use.
- Control: Inspecting the steel surface for scratches, dents, oxidation, and other surface defects, ensuring it is clean, smooth, and free from blemishes.
- Importance: Surface defects can affect the mold’s working precision or cause instability in product quality, particularly in precision manufacturing, where surface finish has a direct impact on the final product's quality.
5. Dimensional and Surface Tolerance Control
- Purpose: To ensure the steel’s dimensions and surface tolerances meet design specifications, preventing issues during processing that could affect mold precision.
- Control: Using high-precision measuring tools (such as projectors, CMMs, etc.) to measure dimensions like length, width, and thickness. Surface roughness is also controlled to ensure the steel surface is flat and smooth.
- Importance: Dimensional tolerance directly affects the manufacturing accuracy and performance of the mold. Strict tolerance control ensures stable and efficient mold use during production.
6. Hardness Testing
- Purpose: To test the hardness of the steel to ensure it meets the requirements for mold use.
- Control: Using Rockwell hardness, Vickers hardness, or other methods to test the steel’s hardness value, ensuring it falls within the specified range.
- Importance: Hardness is one of the key performance indicators of mold steel. A hardness that is too low will result in rapid mold wear, while a hardness that is too high can lead to brittleness and affect mold durability.
7. Heat Treatment Control
- Purpose: To optimize the mechanical properties of the steel through appropriate heat treatment processes, ensuring stable performance during actual use.
- Control: Controlling parameters for annealing, quenching, tempering, etc., to ensure the steel's structure and hardness meet the required specifications.
- Importance: Heat treatment has a decisive effect on mold steel's performance. Proper heat treatment can improve wear resistance, toughness, and fatigue resistance of the steel.
8. Corrosion Resistance Testing
- Purpose: To ensure that mold steel maintains stable performance in moist or corrosive environments.
- Control: Conducting salt spray tests, immersion tests, and other methods to assess the steel's corrosion resistance.
- Importance: For molds used in humid or corrosive environments, corrosion resistance is critical to prevent rusting or degradation, which can affect the mold's service life and product quality.
9. Fatigue Testing
- Purpose: To evaluate the fatigue resistance of mold steel under prolonged high-load use.
- Control: Repeated loading tests are performed to observe if the steel deforms or fractures after multiple load cycles.
- Importance: Molds are often subjected to repetitive pressure and impact during use. Fatigue testing ensures that the steel can maintain stable performance over the long term, preventing early failure.
Through these various quality control measures, each batch of mold steel is ensured to meet strict standards, performing optimally in real-world applications. These tests not only ensure the steel's quality but also enhance the product's reliability and customer satisfaction.
