选择好的行星减速机材料，有利于提高齿轮减速机的承载力及使用寿命。
针对精密减速机的结构特点和齿轮的载荷性质，应该广泛采用硬齿面齿轮。获得硬齿面齿轮热处理方法有很多。如表面淬火、整体淬火、渗碳淬火、渗氮等，应根据齿轮减速机的特点选定。
1.表面淬火
常见的表面淬火方法有高频淬火（对小尺寸齿轮）和火焰淬火（对大尺寸齿轮）两种。表面淬火的淬硬层包括齿根底部时，其效果好。齿面硬度可达45-55HRC.
2. Nitriding
Nitriding can ensure that the gear can achieve high tooth surface hardness and wear resistance under the condition of small deformation. After heat treatment, no good finishing is performed, which improves the load-bearing capacity.
3. Carburizing and quenching
The carburized hardened gear has a relatively large load-bearing capacity, but it is necessary to adopt a finishing process (tooth grinding) to eliminate heat treatment deformation to ensure accuracy.
Carburized and hardened gears are commonly used alloy steels with a carbon fraction of 0.2%-0.3% before carburizing. The hardness of the tooth surface is often in the range of 58-62HRC. If it is lower than 57HRC, the hard surface strength will decrease significantly, and it will be brittle if it is higher than 62HR. increase.The hardness of carburized hardened gear gradually decreases from the surface of the gear to the deep layer, and the effective carburizing depth is specified as the depth from the surface to the hardness of 5.25HRC.
渗碳淬火在齿轮弯曲疲劳强度方面的作用除使心部硬度有所提高外，还在于表面的残余压应力。它可使大压应力区的应力减小，因此磨齿时不能磨齿根部分
