Vacuum Brazing – for When It Really Matters
If you need to combine the best features of two different metals, Thermal Vacuum Brazing is what you need. Vacuum brazing is a material joining technique that offers significant advantages: extremely clean, superior, flux-free braze joints of high integrity and strength. This process is performed in a vacuum chamber that removes all the air molecules that could cause discoloration of the material being heated.
Temperature uniformity is maintained on the material when heating in a vacuum, greatly reducing residual stresses due to slow heating and cooling cycles. This, in turn, can significantly improve the thermal and mechanical properties of the material, thus providing unique heat treatment capabilities. One such capability is heat-treating or age-hardening the workpiece while performing a metal-joining process, all in a single furnace thermal cycle.
Vacuum brazing is often conducted in a furnace; this means that several joints can be made at once because the whole workpiece reaches the brazing temperature.
The heat is transferred using radiate heat, as many other methods cannot be used in a vacuum. These furnaces are batch type being they run one lot through a process, then you remove it and put another in. As the description says, Vacuum brazing or heat treating is done under a vacuum to keep the material from discoloration and scale. This type of furnace can handle larger size parts at extended times and at higher temperatures. The material can be quenched with Nitrogen or Argon gas, which also helps keep the material clean and bright.
We can use various Nickel, Silver, Copper, and Gold-Nickel braze alloys at a high vacuum level or at partial pressure (soft vacuum) level.
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