Gears are a key component of a transmission system, and have been widely employed in motion transmission systems. During operation, they face heavy loads conditions, low noise and long-life requirements. These functional characteristics are highly affected by the surface integrity, generated after the finishing process. In most gears manufacturing chain, finishing is performed by the process of grinding. However, the process abrasive characteristic induces an increase of temperature in the working zone, which, under non-controllable conditions, might lead to grinding burn. Grinding burn is a damage generated by high temperatures, which induces surface properties deterioration. Based on the temperature reached in the process, the damage is more or less severe, but, ultimately, it will affect the material surface integrity. Methods for grinding burn detection have been used in the industry, such as nital etching and Barkhausen noise. However, these methods present significant disadvantages that, at a certain extent, make them non-reliable for industrial application. Due to this technical gap, a method of magnetic surface scanning by means of Hall effect and without the use of magnetization, is proposed. For the analysis of the new method, a prototype was built. On a first phase, the influence of the prototype on the measurements is investigated, regarding the equipment positioning precision, Hall probe contact profile and environmental factors. Next, the ability of the new method to detect grinding burn is evaluated. Three degrees of thermal damage are simulated by laser process, including damages with and without phase alteration. The results for positioning precision showed that the equipment does not impact negatively on the scanning process. The Hall method scanning of damages with phase transformation shows an alteration in the remanence magnetic signal in the workpiece due to the presence of the new microstructure phases. This signal alteration highlights the position of the damage, indicating its presence in the workpiece surface; in addition, the alteration detected by the probe is in accordance with the micro-magnetic theory, which establishes a correlation between the remanence magnetic field and material hardness. The damage without phase transformation presents a change in the residual stress state, from compressive to tensile. In this case, the direction of magnetic signal alteration is not in accordance with the micro-magnetic theory, which is partially explained for the magnetization direction in favor of compressive residual stresses direction. In the end, the results show that the method is able to highlight the presence of an alteration in the residual stress state.