As oxygen negatively affects most production processes in the metalworking industry, a truly oxygen‐free production environment appears attractive in terms of the resulting material and component properties. This overview summarizes research conducted within the Collaborative Research Centre (CRC) 1368. The objectives of this CRC are twofold. First, a fundamental understanding of the mechanisms that govern the interaction between a metal surface and the environment is established. Second, it is researched how this understanding can be exploited to improve current production processes and even develop completely new ones. Herein, data obtained within the first funding period, which already demonstrate that significant effects can be realized in processes such as thermal spraying, cold rolling, compound casting, laser brazing, milling or hot stamping to name just a few examples, are presented. In addition, key aspects such as initial deoxidation of the workpieces, their transport under conditions that prevent reoxidation, and the tools needed to establish and control an oxygen‐free process environment are given, and the ramifications with respect to actual applications are discussed.

In the current study, the potential of dry machining of the titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V with uncoated tungsten carbide solid endmills was explored. It is demonstrated that tribo-oxidation is the dominant wear mechanism, which can be suppressed by milling in an extreme high vacuum adequate (XHV) environment. The latter was realized by using a silane-doped argon atmosphere. In the XHV environment, titanium adhesion on the tool was substantially less pronounced as compared to reference machining experiments conducted in air. This goes hand in hand with lower cutting forces in the XHV environment and corresponding changes in chip formation. The underlying mechanisms and the ramifications with respect to application of this approach to dry machining of other metals are discussed.

The production of massive steel-aluminium hybrid components by means of massive (hot) forming following a joining operation requires advanced heat treatment strategies for the adjustment of local material properties with maximum joint strengths. For the given process-step sequence, the challenge is that the heat treatment of the hybrid component can only take place in the joined state and after (hot) forming. Consequently, suitable heat treatment strategies must enable both a T6 heat treatment of the aluminium component and a surface hardening of the steel component. It could be shown that the inductive surface hardening of a steel functional surface in the immediate vicinity of the aluminium component can take place without reducing the bond strength. To achieve the desired hardening result, the use of a field former is required. The bond strength could be increased by up to 20% compared to the friction-welded initial conditions by adjusting the parameters of the T6 heat treatment.