Heat TreatToday, in cooperation with Nel Hydrogen, is pleased to offer the eBook "Hydrogen Generation and Its Benefits for Heat Treaters"—18 pages of useful information about generating your own hydrogen, a key reducing agent in thermal processing atmospheres. Hydrogen is typically used for brazing, annealing, and sintering of metals.
This booklet discusses the pros and cons of on-site generated hydrogen including costs, sourcing, furnace types, OSHA/EPA compliance, and much more.
Converting to generated hydrogen offers:
Superior atmosphere quality and flexibility
Stable and competitive atmosphere costs
Elimination of hydrogen and ammonia deliveries/storage
A company that manufactures custom magnetic shields, precision sheet metal fabrication, and Hydroforming recently commissioned its first-ever vacuum furnace to accommodate expansions to better serve the magnetic shielding industry by providing material designed to protect sensitive electronics from magnetic fields.
Jason Davidson, Solar Manufacturing’s northeast regional sales manager
MuShield Company of Londonderry, New Hampshire, commissioned Solar Manufacturing to design the furnace, built with a SolarVac® Polaris control system, fully compliant to AMS2750E pyrometric specification, operating at a vacuum level of 10-5 Torr with the capability of maximum temperatures up to 2400°F, and featuring an external quench system designed for pressures up to two bar.
“What this means for us is that we’ll be able to offer quicker turnaround times on heat-treated products, fit larger shields into our furnace, and eliminate outside vendor work,” notes MuShield’s website.
“MuShield was already aware of our excellent reputation in the industry, and they were impressed with our facility when they visited earlier this year,” said Jason Davidson, Solar Manufacturing’s northeast regional sales manager. “They were also impressed with results of testing performed for them by Solar Atmospheres, so we’re pleased they have placed confidence in Solar Manufacturing to provide their first vacuum furnace.”
The new vacuum furnace will also allow MuShield to perform stress relief annealing cycles on hydroformed parts made from non-shielding alloys, which is a manufacturing requirement on most materials that the company hydroforms.
Heat TreatToday is privileged to oversee the 40 Under 40 recognition awards, highlighting a group of young, up-and-coming talent in the North American heat treat industry every year. This year’s Class of 2019 is no disappointment, a group of industry elite, significant contributors to the heat treat market.
Every couple of weeks we highlight two of the current class of recipients. This week we introduce Sergio Gallegas Cantu of Quaker Houghton and Matt Clinite of Ipsen USA.
Name: Sergio Gallegas Cantu
Company: Quaker Houghton
Position: Technical Service Manager & Heat Treatment Specialist
Sergio graduated from Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon with Bachelors and Masters Degrees in Materials Engineering. He is currently the heat treatment specialist and technical service manager for Quaker Houghton (formerly Houghton International) in Mexico. In his role, he interacts extensively with our local team and customer base. He previously worked as senior metallurgist in product development at FRISA in the design of forging process and heat treatments for superalloys, titanium alloys, and stainless steel. He has experience in material specifications for the aerospace industry including mechanical properties, failure analysis, microstructure, and grain size control for near shape forgings.
Nominated by: Quaker Houghton
Name: Matt Clinite
Company: Ipsen USA
Position: Ipsen Customer Service Sales Manager
Matt is very passionate about supporting his customers, being the first to dive in and help customers get their equipment running in peak performance. Even though he is in sales, he loves jumping in to help a customer with maintenance and repairs such as hot zone rebuilds. As customer service sales manager, Matt manages a team of 6 regional sales engineers and is a member of the leadership team at Ipsen. He is a 2018 YES graduate, active in MTI, and serves as an Ipsen U instructor in the company’s 3-day vacuum furnace training program. Matt has been involved in selling some of the most complex and technologically advanced furnace installations in North America, including what is believed to be the largest vacuum furnace in the world (over 10,000 cu.ft.).
Nominated by: Ipsen
Read more about the feature at Heat Treat Today’s 40 Under 40 resource page and find out more about each of this year’s winners by clicking on their image. To nominate someone for the Class of 2020 40 Under 40, please click here.
A medical device outsource manufacturer based in Clarence, New York, which offers heat treating capabilities, recently announced its purchase of certain assets of a manufacturer of complex braided biomedical structures for disposable and implantable medical devices.
Integer Holdings Corporation’s acquisition of US BioDesign, located in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, will add differentiated capability for complex braided and formed biomedical structures to Integer’s broad portfolio.
Integer president and CEO Joe Dziedzic
Founded in 2011, US BioDesign serves the cardiovascular, neurovascular, and general surgery markets with nitinol, stainless steel, polymer, and other braided structures that are enabling the next generation of structural heart, peripheral vascular, neurovascular and electrophysiology products. They also provide product development, material testing, and post-processing services, including electropolishing and packaging.
“The acquisition of US BioDesign assets will allow us to partner with our customers to enhance patient lives in new ways,” said Integer president and CEO Joe Dziedzic. “US BioDesign has demonstrated engineering prowess in the area of complex braided and formed biomedical structures, which will set us apart from the competition as we partner with customers to develop life-saving medical devices.”
Tom Molz, currently president and CEO of US BioDesign
“We are excited to bring our complex braided biomedical structures and capabilities to the leader in medical device outsource manufacturing,” said Tom Molz, currently president and CEO of US BioDesign. “Our combined capabilities, engineering and innovation will allow us to accelerate our growth while better serving our customers and their patients worldwide.” Molz will continue to cultivate the complex braiding business while reporting to Payman Khales, president of Integer’s cardio and vascular business.
Extensive wear or fatigue from friction and contact stress cause many engineering components made of ferrous or titanium alloys to fail. In this Best of the Web
Edward Rolinski,”Dr Glow”, Advanced Heat Treat
Technical Tuesday feature, Edward Rolinski, aka Dr. Glow, from Advanced Heat Treat Corp., compares “wear resistance between engineering components that were carburized vs nitrided,” originally published in his article, “Tribological Performance-Enhancing Surface Treatments for Improving Durability of Engineering Components” at AHT’s website.
An excerpt:
“The results of the tribological studies strongly suggest that for many engineering components, the application of nitriding may be more beneficial than carburizing since the nitrided layer had better wear properties than the carburized layer despite the fact that the layer was about four times as thick.”
Rolinski defines the uses, advantages, and tribological behavior of nitrided and carburized steel and provides illustrations of samples subjected to both treatments.
Main image photo credit/caption: Advanced Heat Treat Corp / Advanced Heat Treat’s Cullman, Alabama, location ion nitroding vessel, which the company says is one of the largest in the United States—”big enough for two small cars to fit inside.”
A cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) has recently been reached that has as its objective improving the process reliability of electric beam melting technology (EBM) through the use of in-situ process monitoring and closed loop control, expanding the technology to new materials systems, specifically nickel-based superalloys, and validating microstructure and properties of titanium Ti-6Al-4V materials fabricated with increased deposition rate.
GE Additive announced that it entered into the five-year CRADA with the US Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). The agreement focuses on processes, materials, and software to drive industrialization and encourage the broader adoption of additive manufacturing technology.
The new CRADA, which covers all GE Additive equipment, materials and engineering services capabilities, focuses on developing and implementing novel additive technologies into commercial products including:
Building on existing research into process simulation methodologies and in-situ monitoring and quality control, on both EBM and direct metal laser melting (DMLM) systems
Materials modeling and development
Industrialization and commercialization of equipment and processes
Moe Khaleel, associate laboratory director for Energy and Environmental Sciences at ORNL
“Our pioneering research with GE Additive was essential to resolving scientific challenges in advanced metals manufacturing using new electron beam methods,” said Moe Khaleel, associate laboratory director for Energy and Environmental Sciences at ORNL. “We’re excited to again push the boundaries with GE and lower the barriers for widespread adoption of more efficient, low-cost manufacturing techniques.”
Daniel R. Simmons, assistant secretary for DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
“By collaborating with industry partners such as GE Additive, DOE’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory brings its multi-disciplinary expertise and capabilities to bear on real-world challenges and moves technologies into the marketplace where they will have the greatest economic impact,” said Daniel R. Simmons, assistant secretary for DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
Josh Mook, innovation leader, GE Additive
“We’re really looking forward to applying the collective brainpower and expertise from both organizations to addressing the challenges around industrialization, but we also have an eye on the future,” said Josh Mook, innovation leader, GE Additive. “The next wave of additive technology is already upon us—whether that’s binder jet or rapid advances in software—so we’re excited to see where the next five years will take us.”
The agreement supersedes an existing CRADA in place since 2012 between ORNL and GE Additive Arcam EBM.
Main photo credit / caption: GE Additive / From left to right: Christine Furstoss, chief technology officer, GE Additive; Daniel Simmons, assistant secretary, US Department of Energy – Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy; Moe Khaleel, associate laboratory director for Energy and Environmental Sciences and Chris Schuppe, general manager, engineering, GE Additive.
Heat Treat Today will not publish on Thursday, November 28, or Friday, November 29, 2019, in order to allow our team time off to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday (U.S.) with family and friends.
We’ll be back with a new newsletter deposited into your in-boxes first thing Monday morning, December 2, 2019—so stay tuned!
In the meantime, allow us to express our thanks to our readers, our advertisers, our partners, and our staff for the part each of you plays in the continuance of this endeavor to make learning a pleasant experience. We believe that people are happier and make better decisions when they are well informed. Thanks to all who share the Heat Treat Today dream.
We also acknowledge that learning is an eternal endeavor and are thankful that God has given us this opportunity to start the process and to keep it going for this long and, we hope, Lord willing, longer into the future.
“The Pilgrims made seven times more graves than homes. No Americans have been more impoverished than these who, nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving.” H.U. Westermayer
Spirit AeroSystems Holdings Inc. recently announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire select assets of Bombardier aerostructures and aftermarket services businesses in Belfast, Northern Ireland (known as Short Brothers); Casablanca, Morocco; and Dallas, Texas.
Spirit AeroSystems president and CEO Tom Gentile
The opportunity to expand its operations into Northern Ireland and Morocco and the addition of the entire work package for the A220 wing and its technology is critical for the future of next-generation aircraft, says Spirit. In aerostructures and fabrication, Bombardier supplies composite and metallic wing components, nacelles, fuselages, and tail assemblies, along with high-value mechanical assemblies made out of aluminum, titanium, and steel.
“The Bombardier operations bring world-class engineering expertise to Spirit and add to a strong track record of innovation, especially in advanced composites,” said Spirit AeroSystems president and CEO Tom Gentile. “Belfast has developed an impressive position in business jet fuselage production, in addition to the world-acclaimed fully integrated A220 composite wing. This acquisition is in line with our growth strategy of increasing Airbus content, developing low-cost country footprint, and growing our aftermarket business.”
A manufacturer of engineered response materials for the oil and gas industry expects to expand its heat treating capability with the recent installation of a new 3,500 MT extrusion press.
The installation of the state-of-the-art press at Terves Inc. in Euclid, Ohio, was completed by Extral Technology SRL, an aluminum extrusion manufacturer based in Italy. Housed within the company’s new 11,000 sq ft H3-classified magnesium metal processing facility, the press will also expand Terves’s magnesium molten metal processing, machining, and storage capabilities.
Extral Technology designed the press to accommodate Terves’s internal production of TervAlloy (a family of patented dissolvable magnesium alloys that provide reliable dissolution rate at a variety of temperatures), as well as for full-scale development services for new alloys.
Heat Treat 2019 was just a month ago, and one of the great benefits of gathering with a community of heat treaters is the opportunity to challenge old habits and look at new ways of doing things. Heat TreatToday’s101 Heat TreatTips is another opportunity to learn the tips, tricks, and hacks shared by some of the industry’s foremost experts.
Today’s Technical Tuesday features tips from Grammer Vacuum Technologies covering Vacuum Furnace and Cooilng.
If you have a heat treat-related tip that would benefit your industry colleagues, you can submit your tip(s) to doug@heattreattoday.com or editor@heattreattoday.com.
Heat TreatTip #59
Oxygen Contamination Sources
A common source of oxygen contamination to vacuum furnace systems is in the inert gas delivery system. After installation of the delivery lines, as a minimum, the lines should be pressurized and then soap-bubble tested for leaks. But even better for critical applications is to attach a vacuum pump and helium leak detector to these lines with all valves securely closed, pull a good vacuum, and helium leak check the delivery line system. Helium is a much smaller molecule than oxygen and a helium-tight line is an air-tight line. Also, NEVER use quick disconnect fittings on your inert gas delivery system to pull off inert gas for other applications unless you first install tight shut-off valves before the quick disconnect. When the quick disconnect is not in use, these valves should be kept closed at all times. (Though the line is under pressure, when you open a back-fill valve to a large chamber, the line can briefly go negative pressure and pull in air through a one-way sealing quick disconnect valve.)
Air-cooled vacuum furnace cooling system (from Dry Coolers)
Heat TreatTip #80
Closed-Loop Water Cooling Systems
Modern water cooling systems for vacuum furnaces are typically closed-loop. (By this we mean that air never comes in contact with the water that goes through your vacuum furnace. The expansion tank would be pressurized with dry nitrogen, in this case, to prevent oxygen pick-up by the water.) Sometimes after maintenance work, the expansion tank or sump is left open to air. As a result, air/oxygen, dirt, and organic materials can get into the water system and eventually cause both corrosion and plugging of your chamber. A plugged chamber can overheat and explode or implode causing serious injury or death. Replacement chambers are very expensive. A recirculating water system that allows air to contact the water entering your furnace can dramatically decrease the life of your vacuum chamber.
Heat TreatTip #89
Lanthanated Moly Alloy Strip Increases Element Longevity
Moly and TZM moly grids can double or triple vacuum furnace throughput by using a two-tier or three-tier fixture to utilize unused work zone space.
Pure molybdenum vacuum furnace heating elements distort with time in service due to growth and contraction during thermal cycling. You can often see this distortion beginning just a month or two into service of new elements. Eventually, these will contact either the insulation/shield wall— or worse yet, your parts—and cause electrical arcing. So they need to be replaced before this happens. By making a direct replacement of these pure moly strips with a lanthanated moly alloy strip, the life of the elements can be significantly increased. We have seen a rough doubling of the element life by making this change. Many new OEM vacuum furnaces are now supplied with lanthanated elements at the start. OEM and aftermarket hot zone re-builders are frequently making this change as well to get longer life out of their hot zone elements.
Heat TreatTip #101
TZM Moly Alloy for Structural Vacuum Furnace Components
For over 30 years, there has been a molybdenum alloy called TZM (Moly-0.5%Ti-0.1%Zr) which is far superior to pure molybdenum in vacuum furnace structural applications. TZM is slightly more expensive than pure moly, so OEM furnace companies use pure moly to keep their costs down for competitive reasons. But they could be offering it as an option for their buyers. Pure molybdenum metal undergoes recrystallization at temperatures as low as 2000°F. The recrystallized structure is very brittle at the grain boundaries, resulting in a structural component that also is very brittle. If you have a vacuum furnace with moly components, you have undoubtedly seen this with older parts. TZM alloy, however, does not recrystallize until around 2500°F, and even then it does not exhibit the brittle behavior of pure moly, because the recrystallized grain size is still very fine. TZM is also stronger than pure moly, as much as 3 to 4 times the strength at temperatures above 2000°F. For a 10-15% premium in cost, you can dramatically extend the life of your moly structural components in your furnaces.
useful information about generating your own hydrogen, a key reducing agent in thermal processing atmospheres. Hydrogen is typically used for brazing, annealing, and sintering of metals.
