A little bit of history

Hardmetal is not properly a metal but an alloy of tungsten carbide and a metalic
binder. The tungsten carbide is a chemical compound of tungsten and carbon
(94% tungsten, 6% carbon) and is the basis of the entire hard metal industry.

Tungsten carbide was discovered by Henri Moissan (1852-1907), a French
chemistand Nobel chemistry Prize in 1906. At the end of 1800, Moissan discovered
that by mixing dusts of tungsten with carbon and heating the content at high
temperature in an arc electric oven, created by himself, he managed to obtain
a hard and wear-resistent material. However, this material was too brittle to be
used for today hard metal application.

This fundamental problem was solved by Karl Schroter in 1914. He worked as
researcher at Osram, in Germany, and he looked into the possibility of finding new materials for the lamp filament drawing.

He found that through the mixture of tungsten carbide dusts and a metalic binding
such as nickel or cobalt, this could sinter at a temperature of about 1500 C
obtaining, therefore, a low porosity product, with a high hardness and
a good toughness.

Hard metal was introduced as cutting tool by Krupp (a German iron and steel
industry) for the first time in 1927. It was registered as “widia" (wie diamant -
like diamond).