Electrochemicals Blog – EPI – Electrochemical Products Inc.

May 14th, 2008

By Eric Olander

 Interesting result with  two black oxide processes,  Ultra Blak 400hot black oxide and  Insta Blak 333room temperature blackening, they provide an excellent anti-galling surface on steel parts. What is anti-galling? Anti-galling is necessary to break in mating parts, the anti-galling surface sacrifices the lubricating layer of black during the initial contact and abrasion while a work hardened surface is formed. An example of this is drill bits and also concrete nailing hammers. A  blackened drill bit when it first touches the steel being drilled into serves as a lubricant to the steel that is being drilled into. After that drilling operation the drill bit is surfaced hardened ready to take on other drilling operations. Another application by one of EPI's customer was concrete  nailing guns. The Insta Blak 333  process actually provided better anti-galling  results than the hot black oxide processes. The Insta Blak process resulted in the appropriate torque values for that anti-galling situation  in concrete nailing guns that the hot black oxide process could not, it was too hard.

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