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Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information
3

Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

(OP)
In reference to my previous post on 'Cryogenic Treatment effect on Hardness' can someone point me to some good reference materials on cryogenic treatment?  I know there is a reference to a paper in my "Physical Metallurgy" Book that I will track down.

Metman, I am especially interested in your comment: <<Transformation to Martensite is not time dependent rather it is only temperature dependent.>>

Thanks again,
Bill

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

The ASM Metals Handbook Desk Edition (2nd Edition) has a brief summary on "Cryogenic Treatment of Steels" on page 980, under the heat treatment section.

<< typical cryogenic treatment consists of a slow cool down (at ~4.5 deg/min) from ambient temperature to liquid nitrogen temperature. When the material reaches 80 deg K (-315 deg F), it is soaked for an appropriate time. The soak period is 24 hours>>

The article goes on to describe the benefit of increased wear resistance based on an evaluation of five high-carbon steels.

Here is some additional information;
http://web.vtc.edu/mt/114/Research/Russ/DCT.htm
http://www.efunda.com/processes/heat_treat/matl_modify/cryogenic.cfm
www.energy.ca.gov/process/pubs/cryog_processing_tc113571.pdf

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

mewhg

Normally I would champion metengr's comments as he has contributed a lot of good stuff.  However, in this instance if you read the first link that he provided -- I don't know about the other two because I did not make it that far -- you are likely to get confused.  The author of that article has mistaken a little bit of knowledge about metallurgy to thinking it is a lot of knowledge and has mixed fact and fiction, braod unsubstaintiated claims, etc.  It smacks of sales talk and cannot be trusted and I believe it simply does not even belong on this forum.

If you want to understand the process of transformation from Austenite to Martensite in carburized 8620 it helps to look at a TTT diagram.  Maybe metengr will provide a link for one.  He is quite handy at helping out on these things.  TTT stands for Time, Temperature, Transformation and the curves show what happens to steel when it is cooled from Austenitizing and held isothermally at different temperatures.  If the steel is quenched rapidly enough to miss the "nose" of the curve, then 100% Martensite is theoretically achievable if the steel is cooled to below the Mf (Martensite finish temperature).  If not quenched, the time lag will allow softer transformation products.  Once the steel is quenched to the Ms (Martensite start temperature), Austeite begins to transform to Martensite and continues to transform as the temperature is depressed until th Mf temperature is reached. In carburized 8620 as in many steel alloys carburzed or not, the Mf temperature resides below room temperature.  Hence subzero treatment is required to reach the Mf temperature.  Why it does not require time for this A-M transformation, I have forgotten but fairly certain there is a thread on this forum that exlains it.  I don't have the Mf for carburized 8620 handy but will guess that it would only require dry ice temperature to transform it.

There is a statement in the link metengr provided that talks about thermal shock. There certainly is such a thing but I don't believe that it would require 24 hrs to alleviate the effects of thermal shock and since Martensite transformation is not time dependent, it all becomes mystical.  when people start talking about "cryo" treatments I get edgy just in case you haven't noticed.  I am sorry but there are legitimate discissions about cryogenics and then there are others.

end of rant

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

metman;
The first link was indeed an error on my part. I had reviewed the link and had mistakenly copied it into one of my download files. I believe it is from an elementary class in metallurgy.

Please review the 3rd link - it is from EPRI and provides a decent overview of cryogenic treatment.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Another Thread discussing Cryo-Treatment.

Thread330-58901

Nick
I love materials science!

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

For different alloy the temperature that you should use is different.  For some alloys there is no benifit to going below -80F.  Other alloys may need for you to go clear to LN temp.  Once you reach the 'right' temperature then you need to allow enugh time, but you can't trade one for the other.  Often the times are short since you have set up conditions where the reactions are highly favored.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Corrosion never sleeps, but it can be managed.
http://www.trenttube.com/Trent/tech_form.htm

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

It depends which calculation method is used for Ms and Mf but one estimate would put the Mf for typical carburizing grades at around -50C for 8620, -70C for 4320 and -100C for 9310.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Above post is based on the nominal chemical analysis for C, Mn, Ni, Cr and Mo for each of the three alloys and a case carbon content of 0.8%

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Should really have given the source reference also!

Andrews K W "Empirical Formulae for the Calculation of Some Transforamtion Temperatures" Journal of the Iron and Steel Institute, 203. Part 7. July 1965, 721 - 727

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

metengr,
Thanks for the clarification.

You said, "Please review the 3rd link - it is from EPRI and provides a decent overview of cryogenic treatment."

Agreed.  Also the second link is a nice summary.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

I found this forum while Googling for "Cryogenic Treatment of Metals".  So now you may hear more from me from time to time.

I have been curious about this technique for a while and yesterday, after seeing an ad in SportsCar, I checked out the www.evanperformance.com site and read their description of the cryo-treating process.  The metallurgical explanation was such a mess that I offered to help them clear things up.  I didn't get very far.  Anyway, left me with the distinct impression that maybe the technique was bogus, or at least the claims were exadurated.  

Today, I found a descent, balanced, and cautious description of the process at www.onecryo.com.  Read their "A Brief of Cryogenic Processing", which was excerpted from a Battelle report.  Excellent.  But then if you click "How" in the menu at the top of the screen the claims, and the metallurgy, disappoint, with statements such as "Even performed properly, heat treating cannot remove all of the retained austenite (large, unstable particles of carbon carbide) from a steel."  Click the "Metallurgy" link at the bottom of the page and you see statements like "resultant tight lattice structures are precipitated from cryogenic treatment" which are attributed to an NBS report.

There might be something to this cryo-treating, but its proponents aren't doing themselves any good in the way they explain the process.  I might try to make it the topic for an upcoming ASM chapter meeting and possibly even a project for an undergraduate laboratory course.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

m610,

That sounds like an excellent idea.  This is a field in desperate need for some scientific experimentation and characterization.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

m610,

It appears you are a newby here.  Welcome aboard and thank you for your apt description of the situation.  I second TVP,s comment.  At some point a FAQ would be nice having a matrix of claims vs (fact, questionable/unsubstantiated, false.)

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Thanks.

Our students are meeting tonight to form a student chapter of ASM/ACerS/TMS and I have talked to a few of them about making this an independent research project for next year.  We have xrd that can check residual stress and retained austenite, tensile, hardness and Charpy testers, we can adapt one of our polisher/grinders (Ecomet 3 with power head) for wear tests, can measure density pretty accurately, and of course metallography, OM, and SEM.  The students sounded pretty interested and might go as far as to try to publish the work at an ASM conference.

Meanwhile, I am going to keep digging around for cryo-treating sites and logging the erroneous and pseudo metallurgial text and claims each company makes for the benefits of their process.  Some could turn out to be OK, but after reading that austenite is a carbon carbide, well, who knows what will turn up.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

m610;
Some pleasure reading I found that may be of interest to your students regarding evaluation of cryogenic treated M2 tool steel;


www2.bc.edu/~huangje/MSE-Steel.pdf

PII: S0921-5093(02)00165-X

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Well, I guess that I have to put my $.02 in.  First, if the students who are researching cryogenic processing for the upcoming conference would contact me, I would appreciate it.  I am the ASM Cryogenic Processing sub-committee chairman, and will assist them in getting their research published whether it is positive or negative about cryogenic processing.

Second.  There are a lot of silly statments about cryo out there, but just try to get people together and hash things out. All cryo processors would be better off if they stopped the wild claims and published things that can be respected.  But they all have their "secret" formulae and a lot of them claim to have invented cryogenic processing, therefore they do not want to "help the competition."  By the way, I have traced cryogenic processing back to Germany in the 1930's at Junkers.

Third. I would appreciate it if you would take a look at our web site( www.metal-wear.com) and our discussion about the process under the heading "More Detail".  I would greatly appreciate feedback, good or bad.  

Fourth:
There is a lot more happening in Cryogenic processing than just transformation of retained austenite.  Cryo has been shown conclusively to increase wear resistance on copper, pearlitic cast iron (brake rotors), aluminum, and abrasives such as aluminum oxide and diamond.

Its good to see some discussion on this subject.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

As a student I joined ASM, American Society for Metals, about 1960. Some years later it was changed to "A Society for Materials International." Today on a technical forum, a gentleman who is chairman of an "ASM" subcommittee provided a link to the company he works for and in their blurb, they repeatedly refer to ASM as "Amercan Society for Materials." I searched the "ASM International" web site a little but could not find the actual current offical spelled-out name of of ASM org. On my current membership card, under the ASM International logo, it says The Materials International Society. in some of the newsletters from our local ASM chapter, the original title, American Society for Metals, is used. Will the real ASM please stand up and be counted? Is there such an organization named American Society for Materials?

Confused

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

metman- I see you posted on the asm-intl.org page as well and hopefully you will get the "official" answer however, my personal understanding is the the registered name of the society is ASM International. This is similar to the old Institute of Welding in the UK which became The Welding Institute and is now formally registered simply as TWI.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Fredrick,
You should probably look a little further back for the beginning of Cryo Processing.
Henry Ford let his CI motor blocks age thru at least one winter in the early 20's.
The earliest reference I found is the little old Swiss Watch Makers aged their steels on the mountains for several winters to stabilize the material and for wear improvement.
You are probably correct in saying  Junkers was the first to publish anything on the process.

In earlier post's I mentioned that we achieved tremendous improvement in wear on small diameter(.0090") drills, broaches, and plugs.  I'm still trying to get my notebooks released as there is a lot of good documented information on Cryo Treatments as related to our process.  Cryo treatment is still the normal on all our components made from D2 and H11 for dimensional stabilization.  

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Metman:
I looked at the history of ASM International and it does not specify what the M stands for any more.  Its just that I recall a lot of emphasis in the late 1980's in the Chicago Chapter that the M now stands for materials.  Metals Park in Ohio was renamed Materials Park, etc.  If ASM comes out with a definitive answer, I will change the website to reflect it.  However we will still put in some description RE: ASM being a materials oriented society for those who visit the website who are not familiar with the society.  

UNCLESYD:
I appreciate your support of cryogenic processing, but the accepted definition of cryogenics is that it involves temperatures below 120K  (-243F, -153C).   This definition is accepted by the CSA (Cryogenic Society of America), and was adopted by the XIIIth Congress of the International Institute of Refrigeration. So Henry Ford and the Swiss watch makers, while making use of cold to improve their products were not getting the advantage of cryogenics.

There is an important difference between cold treating, and cryogenic treating.  The cold treating of steels is usually done just to convert retained austenite to martensite.  The US Army Aviation and Missile Command established that the cryogenic treatment of cold treated 9310 steel (Carburized) doubled the life of the material in a pin and disk wear test.  Cold treatement does not have much effect on copper, silver, titanium, aluminum, diamond, aluminum oxide, etc, but cryogenic processing does.

The above may sound like splitting hairs, but you would not believe the number of people who have told me they are already using cryogenics when they are merely using cold treatment. This is also the source of the phrase I hear all the time that "its only good if you have bad heat treat."  Heat treaters will often claim that they have not seen the results of cryogenic processing after cold treating, so it must be some sort of scam.  If the truth be known, they did not do a real cryogenic process.

This process is very missunderstood, largely because of wild claims used to promote it.  There were also those who felt parts could just be dipped in LN2.  I had a "scientist" tell me he saw no difference in a spring he had dipped.  He did not read the literature (notably from Russia) that found that results are pretty variable for items that are dipped.  Thermal shock is a real and often dangerous prospect.  

Sorry to ramble on.  Thanks to all for a good discussion, and if anyone wants to join the ASM International Cryogenic Processing Sub-Committee or just has suggestions on how we can make this process less likely to collect flak, feel free to contact me.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

unclesyd - we are drifting a long way off topic but the reason for the outdoor storage of Cast Iron engine blocks was intended to improve machining. Machining was in fact improved but it had nothing to do with the temperature, the cast iron parts straight from the foundry often had burnt in sand on the surface which caused severe wear of the cutting tools. Outdoor storage caused rusting of the surface forming a layer of loose scale containing much of the burnt in sand, this rust scale was much more easily detached and tool life improved dramatically.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Carburize,  Continueing(sp?) off topic, would not the "thermal cylcing" from weather extremes also have a stress relieving effect to stabilize distortion to some degree.  This is what I was told why Henry did it but not to challenge the reason you gave.

Frederick,  Thanks for your reply but what about the "A".  Is it A Society International or American Society?  It only stands to reason that the M now stands for Materials and I was being a bit facetious about some still calling it American Society for Metals even though it really is still happening via our local chapter.  Sorry to nitpick but maybe when we get the official  rendering, the referenced company will edit their blurb if necessary to clarify an already murky subject.  People who are not familiar with our creed need to know who are these legitimate organizations/societies that corrobarate or challenge certain claims.

I have read a good portion of your link but have not had time to read as much as I would like.  Maybe I should stop rambling here to gain some time.  I must say that this is very interesting and I admit to being one of those who has been saying, "if you can't support it scientiflcally, then I have some serious doubts."  The link gives some persuasive arguments (I am surprized magnetizm was not mentioned alongside gravity) but I still hope to find, when I have finshed reading, of some more definitive examples in addition to those given.  So far I am impressed with your treatment of the subject and the treatment of the link you have provided.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

There are lots of myths about "ageing" or "weathering" of castings and I tend to think the surface corrosion a helping to scale off the burnt in sand has the most logic to it. I don't think that the temperature range which would occur during storage, perhaps in the most hostile environment down to about -40, would have any microstructural effect on a cast iron.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Regarding ASM International - the ASM no longer is an abbreviation.  Since the society publishes information on materials other than metals, and does so in countries other than the USA, the name was changed to reflect these facts.

As stated above, TWI is another example.  Two others are SAE International and ASTM International.  The world is a much smaller place...

Regards,

Cory

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Frederick--You mentioned that cryo processing has been shown to enhance the performance of cast iron brake rotors. As a former brake supplier metallurgist, I am interested in any documentation you may have on this. I have never seen anything published .

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

RE: Weathering Castings.
I know that all the major car makes did this and also the makers of machine tools.  One of my customers (an Indy car engine builder) tells me his father used to bury engine blocks in the back yard for years to "stabilyze" them.  Jim Birks, an early NASCAR racer and a Indy 500 racer told me that engines he took out of junkyards in Northern Illinois made better, longer lasting racing engines than when he started with a factory new block.  He tells me that one engine in particular was excellent.  It was the one that was "ruined" when the storage shed burned down around it at the junk yard. That is why he started investigating cryogenics with the help of a metallurgist at the Rock Island Arsenal.  That led to him starting our company.  No data here, just experience.

RE:ASM
I will make appropriate changes to our website as time allows.  It just goes to show how things we "know are true" may not be.  Whatever we call it, ASM is a great organization.

SWALL:
I doubt if there is much published.  The US Postal Service has specified treated brakes in Maintenance Bulletin V-03-00.  Greening Labs has tested treated brakes against untreated brakes in private tests and found increased wear resistance.  We've been treating racing brakes and pads for 25 years.  We have numerous police departments that purchase brakes from us and have increased their milage between brake changes considerably.  I hesitate to publish names of my customers for obvious reasons, but if you will contact me I can give you specific examples of fleets where the average milage between brake changes jumped by a factor of two to four times. (My website is listed in a posting above, and I don't feel it appropriate to keep putting in a thread, too much like advertising.) Although this is not a published scientific experiment, it is an observation based on multiple vehicles before and after that shows significant change.  The results are also very repeatable.  It boggles my mind that when faced with this evidence, government and other fleets resist using this process.  For instance, we calculated that on the 70,000 vehicle fleet the State of California has, we could save them $22,000,000/year.  Even Arnold can't seem to force them to do that.  This is a subject for a whole different thread in another forum about why organizations forgo huge savings.  I guess I am rambling again.

The upshot on brakes is that the microstructure of most common brakes is a pearlitic.  Cryogenics should have no affect on it if all cryogenics does is convert austenite to martensite.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

It seems that the target is hard to define or we have found it and it is us.

Back to old Henry.  Having worked with a metallurgist that worked for Henry in the late 20's and 30's he mentioned several times that Henry wouldn't give you the time of day if he thought it might give you some technical advantage.

Fredrick,
Glad that the process of thermal treatment, sub atmospheric, has been properly named.  Also agree that the compilation of known facts for the cryo-processing is underway.  

Having been made aware of property improvements of metals by different cold treatments at the onset of my career in materials in the early 50's and then in the latter 50's  introduction to the cryo process, I been an avid experimenter, somewhat Edisonian.  The initial problems with testing were with the availability of the LN2 or other liquified gases, you couldn’t find them at the corner store and what you could get was extremely expensive.   Our first onsite test were with the condensate off an LH2, Air Force surplus trucked from California,  unloading line to a vaporizer.  
As stated previously we achieved several orders of magnitude in the wear properties of small tools used in the manufacture of extrusion nozzles or spinneretts.  We were also able to stabilize very close tolerance rotating tool steel components used in our process by cryo treatment, didn’t happen at -40°F,  instead of multiple tempers.  
Here is the rub or what might be the lack of published information by people other than the people who provide the services.   There are several applications, metal and others, than I wouldn’t comment on due to the proprietary nature of the applications.  As we had an LN2 facility for many years this knowledge is held in house and not being disseminated   This is true in other companies as well.  
   

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Frederick--In my experience as a brake sytems metallurgist, one of the big variables in rotor and lining performance is the linings themselves. Even linings from the same supplier and same compound can vary tremendously. As far as testing, a brake dynamometer could very quickely show if cryo treatment was of any benefit.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

I've been involved in a similar controversial topic, high does ion implantation.  As with the cryogenic treatment, for a long time people knew it worked to increase wear resistance (and other properties, even corrosion resistance), but did not quite understand why.  So they made up reasons.  Since nitrogen was the most common element implanted, they came up with the view that the implantation hardened the surface by forming nitrides.  Nice try, but 1) you get better performance implanting with inert gases; and 2) the nitrogen is found in only the first 0.1-0.2 microns, whereas the effective case depth is closer to 10 microns.  There also was the theory that the implantation added compressive stress the surface, which gave it better wear characteristics.  So, we used glancing angle x-ray diffraction to measure the change in stress in implanted surfaces.  We found no evidence that an increase in the compressive stress had any effect on wear resistance.

The Russians finally solved the problem by doing the obvious -- looking at the surface beyond the depth of penetration of the ions.  They found the structure greatly altered, down to depths of 200 microns or more.  Within the "case depth" region, i.e., the depth to which the improvements were known to extend, they found large changes in both the volume and character of dislocations.  It's theorized that the changes are caused by either diffusion of dislocations formed in the implanted region, or are created by high strain levels cause by the implantation.  Both theories predict that ion implantation would not improve the wear resistance of aluminum, which is in fact the case.

The bad news is that despite over fifty refereed journal papers supporting the Russian work, there are still proponents of the technology disseminating the previously-disproved theories as to why it works.  The effect is to make is appear to be some sort of magic, and this makes it very difficult to gain support from serious people with serious money.  I suspect the same is happening in the cryo treatment field.  You can show people extensive data on wear performance of cryogenically-treated brake disks, but until you can explain why the process does what it does, backed by solid experimental data published in refereed journals, and accepted by the cryogenic treatment community, you'll have problems expanding the business.

Jim Treglio
Molecular Metallurgy, Inc.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

ASM
I talked with ASM, and they confirmed that the official name of the organization is "ASM International", and that the ASM has no official meaning.  They also confirmed that there was a progression where the M stood for metal, then material, and finally now has no meaning.  I made changes on our website to reflect this, I hope I got to all the pertinent places changed.  

I agree with Jim Treglio that not being able to explain why the process works is a handicap, and thqat attempts to explain citing ill informed theorys as fact really make things worse.

Swall
We, and others have had dynamometer test done by Greening, and the results are usually the same, increased wear resistance with no other changes in braking parameters.  
Linings do vary tremendously.  This aways makes a trial run with a potential customer a nail biter as they rarely will test on multiple vehicles to assure the results are not outliers. But I have customers who keep careful records on their vehicles and have been using our brakes for over 3 years with consistently good results.  They do have an occasional problem that is usually traced to the pad, but they had that with the non treated brakes also.

unclesyd
I agree that there are a lot of companies that keep silent about their use of cryogenics.  A lot of them are my customers who don't want to reveal why they have such a good product. Is ther any more you can reveal about your efforts in the early 50's that I can put in our recorded history of the process?  For instance, what made you start experimenting?

By th way, I just reveiwed some interesting abstracts of papers for the ASM Heat Treating Conference on Cryogenics.  I hope that I can get them into the schedule.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Hello.

I am a newby to this website and am looking for technical data in regard to Deep Cryogenic Processing.  I am researching this industry in regard to its real validity and not someone trying to sell something to me.

Thanks.

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Here's one for you researchers:

http://www.saxgourmet.com/

Enter the site and look at the main menu.  This fellow is advertising a cryo treatment for saxophones.  Says it does wonders...hhmmmmm...

What do you think (as metallurgists)???   I know what I think as a metallurgist AND a saxophone player!  <grin!>

~NiM

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

NickelMet- I bet that Fredrick and the other real researchers fo cryo treatment love websites like that.

Quote (Saxgourmet):

"As tone holes are drawn from the body, as the bell is shaped over a mandrel, and as posts are soldered, the natural lattice of atoms in brass is disrupted, causing internal friction. The natural structure of brass is such that the atoms line up in perfect rows that are densely stacked atop one another. During the manufacturing process, this alignment is disturbed as the atoms are dislocated. The metals ability to resonate is diminished so that only the strongest harmonics of each pitch are transmitted."

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

NickE:

I have been playing for 25+ years and this has got to be the best "snake-oil" sales pitch I have ever heard for making a saxophone sound better.

~NiM

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

NickE is right.

Sometimes it is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to open ones mouth and remove all doubt. Web sites like that one only make it harder to make progress with cryogenics.  The process really is so good there is no reason to lie about it. I really wonder how they get down to -400F with nitrogen.  

The problem here is another salesman saying sales things.  It is generally accepted that cryogenic processing does increase the sound quality of metal wind instruments.  That being said, what makes a pleasant sound is very highly subjective.  In another culture, the affect of cryogenic processing could be negative instead of positive on instruments.

Cryogenic processing does change the vibrational nature of metals.  My research (which is admittedly crude) on the subject shows that resonant frequencies are reduced or eliminated, giving a more pure tone.


RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Frederick:

Thanks for the information.  Admitedly, I've never played a "cured" saxophone.  And maybe - proven through research like you're doing - there is a cleansing of the tone.  But, in my experience as a musician, it still comes down to the mechanical condition of the instrument and the ability of the musician.  And, it ultimately comes down to the audience and their discerning taste.  (Most probably can't tell the difference between Kenny G, Dave Koz, or John Coltrane playing sax.  They only know a sax is being played.)  

You are totally correct on the sound being totally subjective.  I can't see such an improvement in the tone being able to be noticed in a concert hall, an open air performance, or other such occasion.  But, for those of us that are studio musicians, there may be good application to have a cleaner tone, especially in this digital age, for recording purposes.

So, I don't disagree with anything you or NickE is saying. I do wish there would be more "truth in advertising" but we all know that sales pitch means everything.  (Remember the "snake-oil salesmen" of the old west...and of today.)  It is just too bad that certain types use fact and fiction to sell things, not realizing there may be more truth to find out.

Ah well, I'll sit here with my LA Sax and my vintage Selmers, playing "Night Train" and such, enjoying the tones that have made those types of horns famous over the years.  And I'll let the researchers like you do your thing, and maybe someday let the cryo treatment cleanse my horns.

Good discussion ... great information ... thanks everyone!

~NiM

RE: Cryogenic Treatment - Technical Information

Just an example of "cold treatment" which solved a problem.
Here in Australia it is usual for high nickel steels to be case carburised to give high core strength.  These steels invariably have retained austenite in the case.  We had a situation with case carburised pins manufactured from a high nickel steel.  They were developing circumferential cracks after grinding.  This was solved by a cold treatment prior to grinding.

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