Instron has released a High-Temperature Add-On for its Bluehill Universal materials testing software. It extends ASTM E21 and ISO 6892-2 full-test temperature compliance to multi-furnace elevated-temperature tensile workflows, and puts temperature and materials data into a single test record.
The bottleneck is the furnace. Instron says heating and soak times often run longer than the mechanical test itself. The add-on supports multiple furnaces mounted on one test frame, so additional specimens can heat and soak while a prepared specimen is being tested. Furnace and mechanical data for each specimen are stored in the same record.
For labs running elevated-temperature tensile work, the practical gain is less idle time between tests, with temperature logged alongside the mechanical results instead of kept separately.
The software handles furnace setup directly. Users set target temperatures and soak durations inside Bluehill Universal, define acceptable overshoot limits and monitor them during the run. The add-on can also track multiple thermocouples for secondary soaking configurations, with optional furnace-level monitoring. Temperature is recorded continuously through heating, soak and testing, which Instron says supports compliance and gives a complete record of test conditions.
Strain rate control matters here too, because elevated-temperature alloys are sensitive to both temperature and strain rate. Instron's Automatic Loop Control algorithm adjusts system response as specimen stiffness changes during the test.
"With this add-on, we're building on a strong foundation of elevated-temperature testing capabilities, including automatic loop control, to deliver even greater confidence in test results," said Dean Lovewell, Metals Market Manager at Instron.
The High-Temperature Add-On is an optional feature in the latest version of Bluehill Universal.
