Patent ID: 8175744

Claim:
A method for the automatic preparation of technological formulas for the heat treatment of metal workpieces in industrial furnaces using values for a material of a particular workpiece, details of heat treatment methods, and technical details of a particular industrial furnace, a step-by-step specification or generation of parameters, which can be precalculated, for the heat treatment of the workpiece, a computer, which generates a heat treatment program, having databanks and a programmed storage of a generated heat treatment program and the retrieval for activation of the heat treatment in the industrial furnace, comprising the following steps: a) in a first program step, a material group and the material are selected and a heat treatment method is determined as a function of the selected material, b) in a second program step, data of a workpiece batch including a wall thickness are input, a comparative geometry is selected, a batch weight is input, and a batch layout is selected, and a virtual wall thickness is calculated automatically therefrom, c) in a third program step, heating and quenching characteristics, which are a function of the material and are optionally manually changeable, are derived from the virtual wall thickness together with the data of the batch and the available parameters of the industrial furnace, and d) in a fourth program step firstly data of the selected material on treatment parameters and data of the selected heat treatment method are loaded into a formula structure template and are compiled into a formula structure from the formula structure template, employing the data from a user interface, such as heating characteristic and quenching characteristic, and, optionally a target hardness, from which values of formula segments are established, including segment durations, temperatures, ramp slopes and/or temperature ramps, and pressures and then, in the result of the fourth program step, a technological heat treatment formula is automatically generated, which can be readjusted, stored in a program databank, and retrieved for the heat treatment of metal workpieces at the industrial furnace.