A new era in metallographic etching! Tracking down the microstructure with ThEtching.

Etchings are an essential and important part of microstructure characterisation, quantification and classification - not only for examination with the light microscope but increasingly also with the scanning electron microscope. In industrial practice and routine, however, there are still often only a few "simple" structural etchings. The challenges related to increasingly complex microstructures in combination with ever tighter tolerances are increasingly pushing the existing standard etches to their limits. Added to this is the ubiquitous drive to increasingly ban critical chemicals from laboratories.

The enormous potential of alternative etchings and especially colour etchings has been reported several times in recent years. In many metallographic laboratories, however, all etchings are carried out in a fume cupboard without paying attention to other framework and environmental conditions. The etching results obtained can range from inhomogeneous etchings to lack of reproducibility to failed attempts. With the development of the ThEtching, all these challenges - from constant ambient conditions, maximum reproducibility and especially in-situ observation - are addressed. The patent-pending setup will not only make etching very fast and easy in the future, but can also be used to systematically optimise existing etchings and also develop new, adapted contrasting.

In addition to the presentation of the etching machine "ThEtching", concrete examples and possible applications will be presented and the potential for industrial practice as well as for use in research and development departments will be shown.