Metal Heat Treatment Process - Annealing

Annealing, in the field of materials engineering, is a heat treatment process that changes the microstructure of a material and further changes its mechanical properties such as hardness and strength.

The process involves heating the metal to a temperature above the recrystallization temperature, maintaining it at that temperature for a period of time, and then slowly cooling it down.

The function of annealing is to restore the properties of the metal or material reduced by cold working, increase flexibility, ductility and toughness, and release internal residual stress, stabilize dimensions, reduce deformation and cracking tendencies, and refine the grain, adjust or improve the organization of the material defects, and then produce a specific microstructure.
 
During the annealing process, the internal residual stresses are released by the movement of atoms or lattice vacancies, and the dislocations in the metal are eliminated by the process of reorganization of these atoms.

TOP Nanometal Corp. uses the annealing treatment equipment inside the factory to carry out ITO crystallization.

The annealing treatment can reduce the resistivity. The reason is that the elimination of fine grains makes the grain boundaries less and makes the ITO metal layer denser.
 
In addition, the annealing treatment can eliminate the defects in the crystal grains and release the stored energy. Once the energy is released through annealing, the texture of the ITO film will exist as a more stable crystal plane.

If you are interested in our ITO products, please see: http://topnano.com.tw/en-products.php?id=81
 
After annealing, the metal can be further processed, such as stamping, shaping, forming, etc.