Heat Treatment Services

U.S. Inspection & NDT, LLC has a rapidly growing heat treatment services division located in Houston, TX. We have earned our reputation by providing excellent on-site services at customer facilities with our footprints spread across the United States supporting clients on various projects.

U.S. Inspection & NDT, LLC conducts on-site preheat, post weld heat treatment and other applications on single-pipe welds, piping and pressure vessel components, heat exchangers, tank heads, steel fabrication, flanges, etc. The industries we service include clients in industrial, petrochemical, nuclear, manufacturing, new construction, and power plant industries across the continental United States.

Whether your heat treatment application is large or small, USINDT does it all. We bring the heat to you with our experienced team and turnkey solutions that are necessary for the success of a Heat Treatment project.

Our equipment product line is compact, versatile and lightweight which allows our team the ease of use in any application with greater efficiency. We will improve your turnaround time and save you money! We are a fast-emerging industry leader with breakthrough equipment technology and thermal processing solutions.

Local post weld heat treatment operations utilizing the electrical resistance method will incorporate the use of our flexible ceramic pad elements. FCP’s consists of a multi-strand nickle chrome wire encased with 98.2% alumina. The beads are designed to interlock to eliminate wire exposure.

The FCP’s are designed for safe, traditional low voltage operation to provide quick and effective service for many jobs, but it is especially useful for preheating and PWHT.

Heat treatment services are controlled processes used to alter the microstructure of metals and alloys such as steel and aluminum to impart properties which benefit the working life of a component, and then cooled in a particular manner to alter its internal structure for obtaining desired degree of physical and mechanical properties such as: brittleness, hardness, and softness.

Preheat is the application of heat to the weld area and heat affected zone (HAZ). The purpose of preheating is to reduce residual stresses, hardness, tempering and annealing. Preheat temperature must be reached and maintained throughout the welding process.

Interpass temperature occurs when the preheat temperature exceeds approximately 500 degrees fahrenheit (260 degrees celsius). The temperature may spike during the welding process when the welder comes in close proximity to the thermocouples.

Post weld heat treatment (PWHT), or stress relief as it is sometimes known is performed to control the heating and cooling process on metals to alter the physical and mechanical properties. It reduces and redistributes the residual stresses in the material that have been introduced by welding.

PWHT tempers the metal and reduces tensile stresses, minimizing the risks of brittle fracture, stress and corrosion cracking and metal fatigue. It prevents induced cracking and improve ductility, flexibility, and toughness of the material. PWHT performed incorrectly can cause irreparable damage to the material. An incorrect PWHT can be caused by too high of a temperature, excessive soak time, or cooling down too quickly.

Electrical resistance method applications including:

We are constantly striving to improve our performance and committed to providing a dedicated team of thermal processing (heat treatment services) professionals.

We provide heat treatment services to the following Industries:

New Construction | Pipeline | Combined Cycle Power Plant | Oil & Gas | Petrochemical | Fabrication | Manufacturing | Nuclear | Pulp & Paper | Engineering | Gas Processing | Aerospace | Marine | Offshore