annealing

A heat treatment process in which a material is heated to a specific temperature, held at that temperature for a designated period, and then cooled at a controlled rate (typically slowly) to induce structural changes such as grain growth, reduction of dislocation density, relief of internal residual stresses, or alteration of phase composition.

The steel component underwent annealing to improve its ductility and reduce the hardness induced by the previous cold-working steps.