Quench Oil Question

[swall]

My company has in house ferrous heat treat facilities and we recently acquired another company with similar facilities. I have been asked to evaluate their quench oil vs ours and have found that the acquired company is using mineral oil products not specifically intended for use as quenchants. This seems like an inherently goofy proposition to me. Comments?

 

[metengr]

swall;
Sounds like someone (a bean counter), in your front office is looking to cut costs as is typical with acquisitions or mergers. Process steps and costs are evaluated between organizations to implement best practices - sometimes this is not always practical.

 

[swall]

Yes, metengr. That is pretty much it.

 

[metengr]

Hang in there, swall. Sometimes things at upper management levels have to work through a process despite the obvious outcome.

 

[arunmrao]

@ swall,Such practices do not happen in India,perhaps it is from China .

_____________________________________
"It's better to die standing than live your whole life on the knees" by Peter Mayle in his book A Good Year

 

[redpicker]

All you can do is what you are asked.

Relate the flash point, quenching speed, burn point, etc... Your current supplier should be able to help you with this one. In fact, you should be able to get them to do all the work.

To management, they truly do not know why the mineral oil is not suitable. Use this as a teaching moment and do some educatation on the strengths of the proprietary quenching oils.

rp

 

[TVP]

swall,

Has your sister entity noted problems with smoking and/or fires? The only way they can be avoiding them is by quenching very small pieces relative to the volume of oil. Do they regularly perform inspection of the oil to evaluate quench rate (quenchometer test)? I bet they routinely degrade the oil to the point that core hardness varies noticeably.

 

[swall]

TVP--I don't know. I just got the assignment last week; I will be traveling to the plant in the near future for a look-see.