heat treat radio Archives

Heat Treat Radio #15: Jim Oakes

Welcome to another episode of Heat Treat Radio, a periodic podcast where Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, discusses cutting-edge topics with industry-leading personalities. Below, you can either listen to the podcast by clicking on the audio play button, or you can read an edited version of the transcript. To see a complete list of other Heat Treat Radio episodes, click here.

Audio: Jim Oakes

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, speaks with Jim Oakes from Super Systems, Inc., based in Cincinnati, Ohio. SSI develops and manufactures products for the thermal processing industry, including probes, analyzers, flow meters, controllers, software solutions, and engineered systems. Jim Oakes of Super Systems corrals the data about data and makes sense of its use in the heat treating world, covering topics that include the evolution of data collection, sensor technology, data collection for preventative maintenance, operational benefits of data collection, Super Systems data capture explained, the Cloud and security.

Click the play button below to listen.

Transcript: Jim Oakes

The following transcript has been edited for your reading enjoyment.

On this episode of Heat Treat Radio, we’re discussing data. If there is one thing that is significantly changed in the Heat Treat world in the last decade, it’s the quantity and quality of data. What the heck do you do with all the data? How do you collect it? How do you decide which data sets the capture and after you capture them, how can you learn anything from them? Data, data everywhere, and not a drop to drink!

Welcome to Heat Treat radio. I am your host and publisher of Heat Treat Today, Doug Glenn. Today, we’re going to talk to one of the industries leading authorities on data, Jim Oakes from Super Systems Inc. But before we do, why don’t you take a little cyber trip over to www.heattreattoday.com and see all the data we have there? We’ve got aerospace heat treat data, we’ve got automotive heat treat data, we’ve got medical heat treat data and energy heat treat data as well as general manufacturing heat treat data. In fact, we’re adding at least one new piece of heat treating data every day. On Tuesday, we publish technical content. We call it ‘Technical Tuesday. If you’re a manufacturer within in-house heat treat, we’re pretty sure you’re going to find www.heattreattoday.com really helpful.

Before we get started, here is a word about this episode’s sponsor: Today’s Heat Treat Radio is brought to you by Dry Coolers, designers and builders of industrial cooling systems and the professional engineering services surrounding those systems. As a leader in the heat treat industry for decades, they’re located in Oxford, Michigan and supply cooling systems for the aerospace, automotive, medical and energy industries, plus many others. If you have any industrial cooling needs, call Dry Coolers. You can find them on the web at www.drycoolers.com or by phone at 800-525-8173.

Doug Glenn (DG): Let’s get started on today’s topic — data. Our guest is Jim Oakes from Super Systems Inc. Hi, Jim. Take a minute and introduce yourself to our listeners.

Jim Oakes (JO): Hi, Doug, this is Jim Oakes with Super Systems. We’re a technology provider for the heat treating industry. We focus on sensors, controls, and software for the thermal processing and heat treating industry, and we’ve been doing that for over 20 years now.

DG: Jim, how many years have you been in the heat treat industry?

JO: 15 years.

DG: Over the past 15 years, what impresses you about the way we are using data now as opposed to the way we used it back then?

JO: Well, a couple things, actually. My introduction to the industry was actually longer ago than 15 years. I started in an internship, and oddly enough, at that internship — it was for a technology provider in the heat treating industry — I was involved in doing data capture from a PLC at a Timken plant in Gaffney, South Carolina, and that was 25 years ago. Data acquisition has been happening not just in the heat treating industry, but in manufacturing for a very long time. What’s really been changing though, if you look at the last 10 to 20 years, is that the technology is lending itself, because of cost, both from a storage standpoint and processing standpoint, to really being accessible everywhere. You have more information that is coming out of microprocessor controls or PLCs or programmable logic controllers throughout the shop floor. Whether it be a piece of thermal processing equipment or a cooler or anything that is on the shop floor, we have tons of information that is becoming available. Before you might have been worried about how you would store all that information, but that is a thing of the past. The amount of information, and actually making sense of all of it, is where the challenge lies today, certainly not collecting it.

The Evolution of Data Collection

DG: Ten years ago, are you seeing us collecting anything now that we didn’t collect then? Are we collecting more stuff than we were collecting back then, and if so, what are we collecting now that we weren’t collecting before?

JO: That’s a great question, Doug, because back then a lot of the data was very specific and focused on process-related information. Now, there is additional data that is being collected that can be used for some predictive modeling, if you will. It’s not just proof of process that meets the industry requirements. Your customers were expecting that if you used a heat treatment process, then you had to really prove you performed that. Well, that’s a thing of the past. Of course, any data acquisition system that you have today, or anything data-related is going to provide you with that. But now there is more data, so on any day, in any heat treat facility, captive or commercial, I’d say there are 750,000 to well over a million data points that are being collected. Honestly, most people don’t even know that they’re collecting all that information. Their laser focus is on that one specific requirement. All that information that you can have is coming from these microprocessors or PLCs, so the amount of information today versus what you were gathering way back when is really one of the biggest differences.

DG: What are some of the technologies that have driven that change so that now we can collect more?

JO: A couple things. Standardized protocols have been around for capturing data, so you have to have a mechanism to get the data from all of these different pieces of equipment. That’s one piece. It’s existed for a long time. But if you think about it, if you take the shop floor today versus 10 years ago versus 20 years ago, there is a PC everywhere now. You have a networking infrastructure that exists that maybe wasn’t there 20 years ago. Maybe you had a limited number of people that would be able to absorb that information and utilize it. Today, everyone is using a computer. Everybody is using a hand-held device. Now, all of a sudden, that information is readily available to lots of people, and that’s where the difference is. Not only do you have the networking infrastructure on the manufacturing on the shop floor, but you also have the technology that is available to everybody. Computers are everywhere.

Sensor Technology

DG: One of the contentions I have is that the reason we’re able to gather so much more data now is that we’ve had advances in sensor technology. Maybe you can address this a bit. I think there are things we are capturing now that we weren’t even able to capture before because of advances in sensors, whether it be IR sensors, or whatever.

JO: Yes, you’re right, Doug. If you look at the amount of information that is readily available, it is because of the technology that is available to capture it. There is all this sensor technology, whether it’s a limit switch identifying a basket or a tray moving to a specific location, or an infrared device that is used maybe for just measuring temperature on the outside of a furnace shell or an infrared analyzer used for analyzing the gas inside the chamber where the parts are being heat treated. Now you have the ability to take that additional information and use it for a decision making process.

And now you have all this data. Nobody is concerned about the amount of information you’re storing. Nobody ever says, “Well, we’re not going to have that much space.” The problem is people and time in actually evaluating all of the data. No doubt, using a sensor to monitor vibration of a pump or motor, or looking at the current usage, or looking at gas usage — the list goes on of the amount of information you can gather and this is because the cost has gone down. Each of those specific devices are now lower in cost and reasonably achievable from a data capture standpoint.

DG: We might describe it as to say something like: In the past, we used to put all the sensors inside the furnace, as you mentioned, to validate the process and things of that sort. It seems now that, because of cost of sensors and things of that sort, the fact that you can gather all this data and actually do something with it now, that we’re getting sensors on the outside of the equipment to make sure not that just the process is validated, but that the equipment is also validated, if you will, so that we can see troubles coming and that type of thing. Do you agree?

JO: Yes, there is no doubt if you look at some of the benefits of what we see in the heat treating industry today. Of course, operational efficiencies are important. Now you’re taking the data that you’re gathering, again it’s not going to just prove that you’re running the parts properly, but you’re able to make better decisions from an operational standpoint. You can look for better load planning, you can look for reducing time between loads or gap time between loads and identify what’s causing those. The other thing is using this information for preventive maintenance. The equipment manufacturers are doing a great job with providing preventive maintenance programs and it is because of the sensors and the data acquisition systems that you are able to even just locally to that piece of equipment or gather from a plant-wide standpoint. There is no doubt, that some of the biggest benefits are from doing the data capture and then having this different sensor technology that allows for the preventive maintenance programs that can be put into place.

DG: Isn’t that, in fact, where huge benefits can be gained, in the area of preventative maintenance?

Preventative Maintenance

JO: Unplanned downtime is a huge cost component in heat treating. Anything you can do to manage the up-time of your equipment is beneficial. Of course, planned downtime gives you an opportunity to work with customers, work with the product that is flowing through your facility as well as managing the incoming parts that you might need for that equipment. So it’s a huge benefit. You can still do preventive maintenance programs that are in place; it doesn’t have to be with new equipment. You just have to be smart about the things that are important to that equipment and then utilize that data. I always say that data acquisition is very underutilized when it comes to maintenance. The maintenance department is usually one of the busiest groups within the thermal processing industry. A lot of domain knowledge goes into the equipment, but they have a lot of this information that is readily accessible to them, so if they could look at this information and anticipate that fan is going to fail, that motor is going to fail, that there is a short on your electrical elements, or whatever that might be, you’re going to be able to plan for the downtime. That’s going to help from an operational standpoint as well as reduce the amount of time that that furnace might be out of commission.

DG: And when you’re not planning ahead, when you’re responding to fires rather than preventing fires, so to speak, it is usually the maintenance guys who catch the brunt of it.

JO: Yes, that poor guy walks into work every day dreading work because he’s got a crisis on his hands every single time. If you can prevent that crisis, so he can plan to do something, it’s a totally different work environment.

Let’s take a quick break here and remind you that additional support for today’s Heat Treat Radio episode is being provided by Dry Coolers. If there is one thing we know about thermal processes, it’s that things get hot, and to remove that heat from critical areas, you need a system that is reliable, and if necessary, designed for your specific needs. The fact is, Dry Coolers has been custom designing and providing standardized units for decades, and they have the staff and experience to take care of any of your industrial cooling needs. If you’re a manufacturer with in-house heat treating and you need an industrial strength cooling system, make you first, and only call to Dry Coolers. You can look them up on the web at www.drycoolers.com.

Now let’s get back to our interview with Jim Oakes of Super Systems.

DG: Where are you seeing data being used well?

Operational Benefits of Data Collection

JO: The people that are taking advantage of the information are of course meeting the industry requirements. They are staying on top of things like CQI-9 or NadCap requirements from a data collection and meeting the customer requests. That is the foundation. I always say that in a lot of cases, that is a big driver for electronic data. But the people that are really taking advantage of that are using that information for operational benefits. Operational can be both from a maintenance standpoint as well as just improving your overall operations. You’re looking at, “Why do I have downtime of two hours between loads on this particular piece of equipment?” So now, instead of using somebody to go search the shop for, and walk out and get a paper chart, you now have people that can actually evaluate the downtime between loads. You can look at gap times and identify what the issue is. Is it because I don’t have enough fixtures? Is it because I don’t have enough labor? The labor market is tight right now, so you want to use something that is going to provide you with something to maximize efficiency with what you have. Challenges might be your labor or might be your equipment. Are you making the most of your equipment? You can look at that data. You have tons of information. If you can evaluate that, it gives you an opportunity to make better decisions. That is one area.

The other area is, how can you utilize the data and push that out to all your people. Let everybody look at this, but only give them the pieces of information that are important. The maintenance department is going to be interested in maybe the percent output, the current going to the electrical elements, vibration, or water temperature. That information is relevant and if they could isolate that information, they can sit down with their cup of coffee in the morning and they can evaluate this information. Before they have to react to all the firestorms that they have in front of them, maybe they can actually plan for some preventative maintenance activities based off what the data is telling them. The right information to the right person is really critical. The people that are doing this are the ones that are really taking full advantage of the information that they have with a SCADA package.

DG: Is there someone out there that is actually doing it?

JO: Yes, absolutely! There is no doubt about it. People are taking resources, and instead of being reactive and trying to find stuff on the shop floor, they are using the system to identify, answer customer needs and then create those operational efficiencies. People absolutely, no doubt, are taking advantage of that. They are looking at shortening time between loads, notifying users when loads are done so they can get the parts out and then put new parts in. This is happening with mobile devices and/or emails so that the right people are notified at the right times.

DG: Give us the lowdown on what SSI is doing in this area.

The SSI Data Capture

JO: Our foundation provides us the ability to provide information everywhere. This starts with the sensor and taking that sensor data into a controlling equipment, whether course microprocessor control PLC. But you need to make that readily available so that people can make decisions quickly. Proof of process is one thing of course, but so is giving access to information, whether by mobile device or a messaging system. So we’re taking all of the information that we’ve already done in the past and providing that into the technology that people are utilizing today. We see huge opportunities from being able to go through the existing data that’s there, and then look at better ways to capture data based off the technology that is becoming available, whether it’s how we capture usage of gas or usage of electricity or just process-related data to make sure that the right person is getting the right information.

DG: Many of the folks reading this article are manufacturers with their own in-house heat treat plants, and I’m guessing that many of them are wondering what they can do to move in this direction. What should these folks do next?

JO: First step is to do an inventory of the equipment and be realistic about what data you can get out of them, highlight the drivers, meaning what are your business drivers for capturing that information, and then at that point decide if it is just the infrastructure from a data acquisition standpoint or, if you want to get some bigger bang for your buck, maybe you want to make an investment in some equipment that is technology down at each piece of equipment level, to capture that so that you can realize the gains based off of capturing that information.

DG: If a company wants to move in this direction, must they go cloud-based?

The Cloud and Security

JO: No, definitely not. The cloud is a tool that allows basically data and information to be stored externally. The reality is a virtual server in many degrees can potentially be a cloud-based system, but it doesn’t have to be. A large number of the installs we have are storing information locally and then transferring data to the cloud for backup recovery.

DG: Address cloud-based security, if you would.

JO: It is a huge topic from a security standpoint and I would say that most of the companies that use the SCADA packages are on-premise. That is not all of them, but most of them are. This means that if you are on premise, you have a private network where it is not accessible from anywhere unless you create that tunnel into that private network using virtual private network. That’s what you refer to as on-premise. Then you have cloud-based system, which is really just pushing that information up to a server form which provides access into it. Of course, there is a security aspect regarding accessing that information. A strategy has to be put forth that prevents external access to that information. In many cases, if you decide that you’re going to go to a cloud-based system, you’ve already thought through that and you’ve probably already transitioned some other systems to that. Anyone that is going to a cloud-based system has some security requirements to prevent any illegal or unwanted access.

DG: Jim, thanks for your time.

JO: Doug, thank you for having me on Heat Treat Radio. I really appreciate the opportunity. This topic is important to us here at Super Systems. As a technology provider to the industry, we really like to get the word out there about what types of things are coming, whether it’s making data accessible at the hand-held level, or helping make decisions, it is something that is near and dear to our heart and that is because a lot of our customers really find this necessary. I appreciate you spending the time with me and I really look forward to having discussions around this in the future.

That was Jim Oakes of Super Systems Inc. talking about data and how to get the most out of that data. If you’d like to get in touch with Jim, please email me directly at doug@heattreatoday.com and I’ll put you in touch with Jim. Super Systems can be found on the web at supersystems.com.

Suffice it to say, you will be hearing more from Heat Treat Today about data and how to use it more effectively for your business. To see more heat treat technology articles, go to www.heattreattoday.com. We post a new heat treat item, either a technical article or some industry news, every weekday. If you’d like more Heat Treat Radio, simply Google H”eat Treat Radio”. We’re the first thing that pops up. You can also subscribe to Heat Treat Radio on iTunes or SoundCloud.

One last reminder that today’s episode of Heat Treat Radio was underwritten by Dry Coolers. If you have need for any industrial cooling system, give the good people at Dry Coolers a call. They are on the web at www.drycoolers.com.

This and every other episode of Heat Treat Radio is the sole property of Heat Treat Today and may not be reproduced without express written permission and appropriate attribution from Heat Treat Today. Jonathan Lloyd of Butler, PA, produced and mixed this episode. I am your host, Doug Glenn. Thanks for listening.

Doug Glenn, Publisher, Heat Treat Today — Doug Glenn, **Heat Treat Today** publisher and **Heat Treat Radio** host.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #15: Jim Oakes Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #14: ITPS and ThermProcess 2019

October 25, 2018 / FEATURED NEWS, HEAT TREAT NEWS INDUSTRIES, HEAT TREAT RADIO

In this conversation, Doug Glenn, publisher of Heat Treat Today and host of Heat Treat Radio, interviews Anne Goyer from IHEA, Eva Rowe from Messe Dusseldorf North America, and Peter Sherwin from Eurthorm by Schneider Electric to discuss the International Thermprocess Summit 2018 and Thermprocess 2019.

Click the play button below to listen.

If you’re looking for that ONE place where you can invest your time and know that you’ll walk away happy, then today’s Heat Treat Radio episode is one you’ll want to hear. In this podcast, Anne Goyer from IHEA, Eva Rowe from Messe Dusseldorf North America, and Peter Sherwin from Eurthorm by Schneider Electric join Heat Treat Radio host Doug Glenn to discuss the two most important international heat treating events – one in North America and one in Europe — the International Thermprocess Summit 2018 (ITPS) and Thermprocess 2019.

Peter Sherwin
Eurotherm by Schneider Electric

Eva Rowe, Messe Dusseldorf North America

Doug’s three guests review the talks and news from the North American event, ITPS, which was held earlier this year, July 30-August 1, in Atlanta, Georgia. Peter Sherwin describes the talks that impressed or stood out to him the most. Anne Goyer addresses the floor talk from attendees and vendors regarding future shows. Eva Rowe reveals what participants can expect at Thermprocess 2019, which will be a quartet of shows which they’ve called the “Bright World of Metals.” The four events that are combined into this “Bright World of Metals” are Metec, Thermprocess, GIFA, and Newcast. All will take place in Dusseldorf, Germany, next June 25-29, 2019.

And don’t forget that here in North America, the two leading heat treating trade shows are Furnaces North America in the even-numbered years, and ASM’s Heat Treat Show in the odd-numbered years. To find out more about any North American heat treating event, visit www.heattreattoday.com and take a look at our calendar of events under the Resources Tab on our home page.

If you’d like to get in touch with any of the people from today’s Heat Treat Radio podcast, please feel free to contact me by email at doug@heattreattoday.com. And don’t forget to check out Thermprocess 2019 by going to www.thermprocess-online.com. Start making your plans to attend now. June 25-29, 2019 is just around the corner.

To find out more about the potential International Thermprocess Summit 2020, stay connected to Heat Treat Today or visit the Industrial Heating Equipment Association’s website at www.ihea.org. Both sites will post any future dates and locations for a 2020 event if or when the decision is made.

For more Heat Treat Radio, Google “heat treat radio” or look under the Resources Tab on www.heattreattoday.com.

Special thanks goes to Dry Coolers for their support of Heat Treat Radio. Dry Coolers, cooling systems for industry … on the web at www.drycoolers.com.

This episode, as with all episodes of Heat Treat Radio, are the sole property of Heat Treat Today and may not be reproduced in part or in whole without express written consent from Heat Treat Today.

If you have a topic you’d like covered on Heat Treat Radio, please contact Doug Glenn at doug@heattreattoday.com.

This episode was produced and mixed by Jonathan Lloyd, Butler, Pennsylvania.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #14: ITPS and ThermProcess 2019 Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #13: C3 Data

September 20, 2018 / HEAT TREAT RADIO, INSTRUMENTATION TECHNICAL CONTENT

Audio: C3 Data

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, interviews Nathan Wright of C3Data, a company based in Indianapolis, Indiana, which assists heat treaters and calibration labs ensure furnace compliance with Nadcap, AMS2750 & CQI-9. Their discussion about how you can cut the amount of time you spend testing and repairing furnace calibration report for your CQI9 and NADCAP compliant furnaces — from what might currently be up to an hour or more, per furnace, to somewhere down around five minutes per furnace — will help you imagine the day when you can have a single dashboard in your office where you can see in real time whether your furnaces are currently compliant with those standards or your own custom standards. Imagine not having to guess if your furnace is compliant or having to wait until the next SAT or TUS is performed to find out that you just ran two or three loads in a furnace that is out of spec. Also, imagine being able to click a few buttons and have a fully code compliant report printed out in minutes for when the auditor shows up at your door. After listening to today’s Heat Treat Radio podcast, you’ll be one step closer to making this a reality in your shop.

Click the play button below to listen.

Transcript: C3 Data

The following transcript has been edited for your reading enjoyment.

Welcome to Heat Treat Radio. I’m your host and publisher of Heat Treat Today, Doug Glenn. Before we jump on the phone with Nathan Wright, of C3 Data, let me encourage you to visit www.heattreattoday.com for more helpful heat treat information. Manufacturers with in-house heat treat departments, especially in the aerospace, automotive, medical and energy sectors as well as general manufacturing, find this site especially helpful. Every weekday, at least one new piece of technical or commercial news is posted to the site. The site also includes a new feature: Heat Treat Consultants. If you have ever wondered where you can find a simple, concise list of heat treat consultants, check out Heat Treat Today. You can find it on the site under the “Resources” tab. Today’s Heat Treat Today radio episode is brought to you by Dry Coolers. Designers and builders of industrial cooling systems and the professional engineering services surrounding those systems. As a leader in the heat treat industry for decades, they are located in Oxford, Michigan, and supply cooling systems for the aerospace, automotive, medical and energy industries plus many others. If you have an industrial cooling need, call Dry Coolers. They are on the web at www.drycoolers.com. Or you can reach them by phone at 800-525-8173.

Heat Treat Radio jumped on the phone and called Nathan Wright to discuss this new technology. Here’s a lightly edited version of our conversation. Nathan is a long-time pyrometry guy with multiple pyrometry labs around North America, including a lab in Mexico. With several decades of experience in the industry, Nathan was pretty convinced there was a better way to do pyrometry and furnace compliance. Here’s Nathan to explain what it is, exactly that his company, C3 Data does for the heat treat market.

Nathan Wright (NW): Heat treaters and other companies come to us to help them reduce the cost to comply with NADCAP. So if you are a NADCAP heat treater, and or trying to become compliant with CQI9, you are an ideal client. So, companies come to us to help them reduce the cost associated with trying to comply with those two specifications, specifically with respect to the pyrometry requirement; so, in terms of time and money spent, we help them reduce those costs. We do this by leveraging two very simple technologies: the cloud and mobile devices. And we use these to eliminate virtually all of the time spent writing reports and calculating correction factors and ensuring that all the equipment that you use is compliant. We build these higher specs into the software so that all the end user has to do after they set their exponents is plug in the readings, and we do the rest.

Doug Glenn (DG): And it’s cloud-based?

NW: That’s correct. It’s cloud-based in terms of where all the data is stored. But we do have, as I mentioned earlier, the mobile technology that is used, sort of a modern-day version of the clipboard. When a pyrometry technician is out in the field, rather than writing down on a piece of paper or lugging around a laptop with an excel spreadsheet, there is an app specifically designed for those types of testing requirements. And that’s done all on the mobile device. The app really knows everything about the furnace when you walk up to it. We integrate QR codes into our calibration labels that get printed, and simply by scanning the barcode on the furnace, the app knows everything about your furnace from the furnace class to the operation ranges to the instrument types, the calibration points, everything about it. So, in terms of training and the technician making sure that that furnace is tested and compliant with the specs, it’s kind of a no-brainer. Walk up, scan the QR code, and the app kind of walks you through a tutorial step by step, and at the end, it gives you sort of a green means go, red means no indicator as to whether or not the test that you are performing passed or failed.

DG: I understand the spec is built right into the app. So, if, or should I say when, the spec is updated, your app is updated and the end user pretty much automatically has the new spec immediately on his device.

NW: That’s correct. And we intentionally sit on a couple of the committees — CQI9 as well as the AMAC committee — when you talk about AMS . . . really just to participate in the conversation to understand what changes are being made to the new revisions of both of those specifications. So, proactively, we have our coders in the background sort of prewriting some of the code that may or may not become part of the specification. So that from day 1, all the customer would have to do is refresh their web browser (for the web version), and on the mobile app version they simply do the auto update on their app, and they know moving forward that every test they do from that day forward is in compliance with what will be the AMS 27 revision F, and of course with CQI9, it will be rev. 4. So, yes, we address those concerns by being actively connected with those communities and ensuring the software automatically gets updated.

A Better Way: The Story Behind C3 Data

DG: So, tell us a bit about how this all came about. And also about you.

NW: I started doing pyrometry work, I’d say calibrations, surveys, and SATs, approximately twenty years ago. And I always had in my mind that there had to be a better way of doing this type of testing. Having sat in literally hundreds of NADCAP audits myself, there’s just a lot of human error that goes into — I guess the root of the non-conformances, and I even tried to bring a C3 Data like product to life back in the most powerful hand-out tool that you could get — a palm pilot. So, you can see that I’ve been thinking about this in depth for quite a while. And anyone who’s ever had to do an SAT, and all that’s required to make sure the equipment is current and then actually doing the reporting, knows the agonizing pain that goes into doing this type of testing. So, after twenty years of doing that I have a unique perspective on how to build this from the industry. So we started building the product, the C3 Data product, for our own pyrometry labs. I’ve been doing this for twenty years. I own two labs, and as I mentioned earlier, we just wanted to build a tool that would eliminate most of the arduous and daunting parts of the pyrometry compliance. Anyone who is responsible to comply with NADCAP, CQI9 – they know that it’s the paperwork administration, it’s the scheduling, and frankly, sometimes it’s just the math. So, in a sense, we can honestly say that we built this product with each customer in mind because we do the same things that they do and we initially built it for us. It’s pretty exciting to get the word from our subscribers that they are saving a lot of time and eliminating the NCRs. I talk about saving time. . . . We’ve had customers tell us as much as 60 percent of the time that they were spending doing testings and reportings, has been reduced by 60 percent. We are pretty excited about those numbers.

DG: I imagine it’s not only the time savings that is a real benefit, but the peace of mind knowing that you are compliant – especially when the auditor comes a-knockin’!

NW: Yes, I would say that the most comforting feeling — from one of our subscribers – is going into a NADCAP audit knowing, with confidence, that all the information that is required is there. Not only is it there, but it is all compliant. No matter what report you pull up, whether it’s a certification for a thermocouple or for a daylogger or for a field test instrument. Any type of test result is insured and guaranteed to be compliant because the system is built around those specifications and doesn’t allow you to make some of the most common mistakes that are attributed to about 50 percent of the non-conformances really are pyrometry related. So the confidence that the end user has is really high going into an audit. And anyone that has been in an audit knows that that is the most nervous day.

DG: You mentioned “we” when you were talking about the company. Tell me a bit about the company now. You have some pyrometry labs, correct?

NW: We do, we have a couple of laboratories. One in Mexico, one in the midwestern part of the United States, but in the last three years, I’ve sort of taken a back seat to those companies in order to really focus on C3 Data. We’re headquartered in Indianapolis and the product has actually been under development for about five years although it has only been commercially available, I guess, going on now about three years. So we employ a staff of five here in the U.S., and more recently we’ve established sales and support channels in Europe – covering the UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. So, we are excited about that new relationship and getting that product in the hands of a large segment of the heat treat world over there.

DG: Are there different standards there in Europe? Or are they all the same?

NW: No, No. Very similar. I mean, it’s the AMS 2750 for NADCAP accredited companies and CQI9 for the automotive. In fact, well, CQI9 was authored by the big three here in the U.S., and for several years, Europe was not really recognizing that standard and more recently with several automotive recalls in Europe from European manufacturers, they were really looking for a way to minimize the large expense associated with those non-compliances and recalls. And so, they really have, in the last nine/ten months – more recently — started to adopt CQI9 pro-actively because rather than write their own specifications they wanted to adopt it. So we are pretty excited that we don’t have to customize the software for yet another specification. I will say, speaking of custom specification, the software is not limited to just AMS and CQI9. We do have a build-your-own spec feature that is built into C3 Data that allows you to take a Boeing spec that by and large is AMS 2750 but has its own nuances that are associated with an individual prime like Boeing, just to use them as an example. And so we allow users to go in and build their own specifications to ensure compliance to not just the prime specifications that we typically think of (i.e. AMS and CQI9).

DG: And now for a quick reminder that this episode of Heat Treat Radio is being sponsored by Dry Coolers. Dry Coolers can provide open evaporative towers, closed loop evaporative towers, air cooled or dry cooler closed loop systems, chillers, vapor coolers and condensers, pumping stations, control panels, emergency backup systems, filtration and solids removal equipment, as well as complete plant-wide water systems. If you have any industrial cooling need, call Dry Coolers. They are on the web at www.drycoolers.com or by phone at 800-525-8173.

C3 Data in Action

DG: So, Nathan, how would this look for a heat treater? How do they interface with C3 Data? You mentioned subscribers.

NW: It’s set up as what we call “software as a service”. So, unlike a traditional software product where you buy it once and own it, and then pay for incremental updates, we just have a subscription service that the user can customize based on their needs. If you are just using the software to perform SATs, there is a fixed monthly fee. But if you wanted, a year later, to add temperature uniformity surveys, or instrument calibration, you can incrementally bump up and add on plugins to the software. It’s all web-based so the beauty of this is that there is no IT that needs to be involved. There’s not a lot of technology that the end user needs to have other than how to go to the website and log in to their password-protected account. You can increase or decrease your subscription levels at any time and it’s month to month. There are a lot of advantages to this software model because it is low risk. You can try it out. You can cancel it a month later and decide that it’ not for you. So, we like that. The biggest, most powerful part of software and servers being web-based is, as we mentioned when these specifications get updated, we can simply update them in the background and the end user just has to refresh their browser and instantly the update is made. The system is very intuitive. By the way, the subscription service comes with unlimited phone and email support. So, as you bring on new users, we will train them. This is typically done through a “go to meeting” online, so there is no need to incur travel expenses. And we can do a twelve-minute meeting, we can do a two-hour meeting with a large group if we need to. We can customize the training based on the skill set of the group or group of individuals that are using the software.

But in terms of the setup, I think the biggest hurdle is getting all the information into the system. The system only knows what you tell it. So, there is a section in the portal where the user can go in and must go in and define all the furnace settings. So, we talked earlier about instrument types, operating ranges, furnace classes, all those types of things. Once you define all those, what we call furnace set up variables, the system will hand walk you through everything. I guess my only point is that there is a little up-front investment to populate the user account with all the furnace and instrument information. That’s probably the biggest hurdle for any user because we have knocked down all the other hurdles – the training, the updating of the software as we mentioned is a simple refresh of the browser. So, it’s very intuitive but there is a little bit of upfront time involved – and we say about five to ten minutes per furnace is the typical amount of time spent and that can be reduced over time by getting people familiar with the software. So, if you are a typical, well I shouldn’t say typical because there is no typical heat treat size, but a heat treater that has ten furnaces, it might take you a couple hours to populate your system.

DG: Well, five to ten minutes per furnace does not sound like much. Tell us a bit about this dashboard.

NW: Dashboard culminates all the information that’s being populated in a single system, and it gives the ability to display a real-time plant overview of all the furnaces and their real-time compliant status against the specifications. So, we have customers out there currently that have 60- to 70-inch television monitors displaying the C3 dashboard. And in their procedure, the operators of the furnaces are told that before they load a furnace, the first thing that they do is that they look at their C3 Data dashboard and they verify that that furnace is either green, yellow or red. Depending on the company, they may have different protocols, but ultimately if it is red, you are supposed to stop as the furnace operator and go to your boss and say, “Hey, I can’t load this furnace because it is not compliant. What should I do?” And, there is a lot of power in that because, you know, currently the systems that exist today are spreadsheets or, worse yet, printed pieces of paper that just sit stagnant in a filing cabinet and they don’t tell you anything in real time. Meanwhile, furnaces are being loaded — potentially furnaces that are not compliant — being loaded with product that are safety critical parts for the aerospace and automotive industry. So, dashboard really takes that culmination of a lot of details of compliance-related information and gives it to you instantaneously. This also gives the ability for a quality assurance manager of a company that may have multiple locations to sort of figure out where he or she should be focusing their efforts on helping with furnace compliance. Case in point, if you have seven different facilities that you are responsible for as a quality assurance manager, you are going to want to go to those places where more furnaces are red and not really spend any of your time in those locations where all those furnaces are green. And so this allows them to have that real-time visibility without ever leaving their desk and make real-time decisions about where they need to focus their time and energy.

DG: Any specific heat treaters that will find this system helpful? Or is it pretty much broad-based?

NW: Generally speaking, any heat treater that needs to ensure high quality should be using a system like C3 Data. And many do. The problem is that most people have failed at what we call rolling their own. These systems range the gambit. They are also susceptible to the same issues. Namely, the cost to manage these cobbled together mixtures of cell spreadsheets, and outlook for scheduling and other tools that they combine and rely on, and there is usually what we call the “key man” risk associated with these systems. And that employee may or may not always be employed there to keep the system up to date. So this usually causes frustration and ends up costing much, much more than people think. But, to be specific to your question, the customers that are NADCAP, or just simply required to comply with AMS 2750 or CQI9, they rely on the software and so any customer that’s, as we mentioned, that’s looking to comply with those specifications, C3, all those specs are included out of the box with C3. That would be our ideal demographic.

DG: Anything else like it in the marketplace? And if so, how does C3 differ?

NW: There are a few companies that have attempted to build what C3 Data has. But I would say that they all suffer from the same two problems. Their software was not built around the prevailing specifications like the AMS and CQI9, as we keep mentioning. And secondly, they were built by people that don’t do pyrometry. So, the user experience quickly becomes frustrating for people using the competition’s product. Because, unless you have done this type of work, it’s really impossible to know all the limitless permutations of the spec and account for them all. So, their software ends up running you instead of the other way around. Another thing that is unique about C3 is that we allow the user to fully integrate with existing service providers and vendors. For example, if you had a lab that is coming in on site to perform your calibrations, their reports will automatically funnel in to the C3 account. And they are available in real time. So, that’s one. I mean we integrate with sensor vendor. GeoCorp is one of our sensor vendors. When you buy a thermocouple from GeoCorp, and you have a C3 Data account, your sensors will automatically get pulled into your C3 Data account. Including all the correction factors and the math associated with the rounding and all that, so there is a lot of integration with the vendors and service providers – including data logger manufacturers. But there are some major data logger manufacturers that integrate directly with our temperature uniformity survey software that, again, all that calibration data for those loggers technically can go into our system as well as generating temperature uniformity survey reports that are fully compliant in less than five minutes. So, this is a big one. I think there are listeners out there who have done surveys know that a survey report can take, and it varies depending on your experience and what systems you have, but it can take anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes and even sometimes an hour just to do a report. We can consistently offer a product that does this in less than five minutes and guarantee its compliance. But I think our biggest competitor is really not a company, it’s the status quo. People who are “getting by” with their in-house systems and they don’t know what else is available and they don’t realize the tremendous cost they currently are incurring doing it the way they have always done it. So, that is probably our biggest competitor – getting past the “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” type of mentality.

Nathan didn’t want to name drop during the podcast but shortly after the interview, Nathan informed me that C3 Data signed a distributor agreement with CCPI Europe, Limited – to represent C3 Data in Europe. CCPI will do essentially the same thing in Europe that Geocorp does here in North America. CCPI Sensors will integrate directly with C3 Data for customers in that part of the world.

DG: And how about when the auditor walks in. Do most of them accept your reports?

NW: Most auditors have accepted it. We are trying to get the word out to a lot of the NADCAP auditors that this is a user-friendly system and that it can be trusted. As a result of some of the feedback we have gotten from some auditors we’ve built in some, I guess, “check your math here” kind of thing — they want to know — yes, it says that the test passed because I see the number turns green instead of red but how do we know that? And so we’ve built in some software validation tools in there for NADCAP auditors to become more comfortable by seeing the math behind the numbers. As well as for our users. But, yes, you are right. The most rewarding moment is the day of the NADCAP audit, you can go to the single screen where you have scheduler and tests. You have one system. Not a filing cabinet, not an excel spreadsheet and another spreadsheet on a different file server. It’s one system accessible anywhere on the web that you can go and have a NADCAP audit. You can personally have a NADCAP audit remotely. In an ideal world, that might be something that is considered by PRI someday but the beauty is, yes, it’s in one location. You are never chasing down paper. And the bottom line is you know that it’s all compliant – 100 percent of the time.

So, if you are a captive or commercial heat treater looking for smart ways to reduce your compliance investment, you might want to take a look at C3 Data. Here’s a system that could significantly reduce the time you invest in conducting the litany of compliance tests required and the time it takes to prepare those time-consuming reports after each test. Better to let C3 take care of it. If you’d like to contact Nathan, feel free to email me directly and I’ll put you in touch with him. You can email me at Doug@heattreattoday.com. C3 Data is on the web at www.C3data.com. And you can reach out to Nathan that way as well.

Special thanks go to Dry Coolers, Inc., for their support of Heat Treat Radio and for their sponsoring this podcast. Dry Coolers, industrial cooling systems, made to order. Dry Coolers is on the web at www.drycoolers.com.

Don’t forget to visit www.heattreattoday.com frequently. We post a new heat treat industry item – either a technical article or some industry news — every weekday. If you would like more Heat Treat Radio, simply google Heat Treat Radio. We are the first thing that pops up. Or, you can also subscribe to Heat Treat Radio on iTunes or Soundcloud. This and every other episode of Heat Treat Radio is the sole property of Heat Treat Today and may not be reproduced without express written permission and appropriate attribution from Heat Treat Today. Jonathan Lloyd of Butler, Pennsylvania, produced and mixed this episode. I’m your host, Doug Glenn. Thanks for listening.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #13: C3 Data Read More »

Reader Feedback: On Ceramic Coatings

September 10, 2018 / INSULATION TECHNICAL CONTENT, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT, READER FEEDBACK

Here is what readers are saying about recent posts on Heat Treat Today. As is our policy, we allowed the original author to preview and respond to this reader feedback. See Greg Odenthal’s response at the bottom of this post.

Submit your reader feedback comments to editor@heattreattoday.com.

William (Bill) Jones of Solar Atmospheres Inc. on the Heat Treat Radio podcast interview with Greg Odenthal of ITC Coatings. Click here for the podcast (transcript here):

William R. Jones, FASM, Solar Atmospheres Inc.

Re: Heat Treat Radio: ITC Coatings

This would be a poor selection for a vacuum furnace as it is well known that ceramic coatings and the like are hydroscopic and will absorb water from the atmosphere when opening the furnace to air for work unloading and reloading, with adverse effects on following vacuum pump down, i.e., to pump out the absorbed water vapor.

With respect to ceramic lined refractory insulated atmospheric furnaces: I can respect the coating for sealing an older furnace lining for porosity and lining leaks to the outer furnace wall and for improving re-radiation to the work load with well-known surface emissivity improvement. This is not an easy coating to apply and will require maintenance “man-hours”. So one has to balance the coating time and coating cost compared to furnace out of production cost. Furnaces are like airplanes, when sitting on the ground for any purpose, they lose money.

Now, when looking at furnace hot zone efficiency, one has to review power losses both before and after changes such as coatings. With an electric furnace a totalizing wattmeter or with a gas totalizing gas meter similar to our utility company meters. Such data needs to be presented for both furnace before and after coatings on an exact furnace and production cycle.

William R. Jones, FASM

Solar Atmospheres Inc.

We offered Greg Odenthal of ITC Coatings the opportunity to respond:

Greg Odenthal, Director of Engineering & Technical Operations, ITC| International Technical Ceramics, LLC

Mr. Jones,

I cannot agree or disagree with you regarding your opinion that ITC Coatings are a poor selection for vacuum furnaces as we have never tested in nor targeted this industry. It is true that ceramic coatings are hydroscopic; however, I’m not sure just how much water/moisture a layer of ceramic coating only 1 to 2 mils thick will absorb. With that being said, any moisture absorbed would wick away in a very short period of time. Whether or not they are good for the vacuum heat treating industry is still up for discussion.

As for your comment regarding that this is not an easy coating to apply, I must tell you that you are wrong. I have been onsite on just about every installation that we have done and our crew size can be very small. For an average size heat treat or forge furnace — for example, 32’ L x 16’ H x 15’ W with a new ceramic fiber lining — a crew of two men can and have coated the entire square foot surface area in an eight (8) hour shift. The cost of the coatings and labor to install is pennies on the dollar compared to the cost of regularly scheduled downturns every 3 to 4 months to pack joints and cracks with new fiber, trying to prevent heat loss and increasing fuel consumption. We have current customers that have not done any refractory maintenance in four to five years and now only have one outage per year for their yearly furnace inspection. Once installed, the ITC Coatings increase a furnace’s efficiency by reducing refractory maintenance, reducing fuel consumption, improving temperature uniformity, improving product quality, improving turnaround times, along with a host of additional benefits, thus preventing the furnace from costing the customer money, unlike your grounded airplane analogy.

In regard to hot zone efficiency and gas/power reduction, we have been working with the gas supply companies in Canada who are currently monitoring our customers’ fuel usage and see the reductions. They are now beginning to give current and potential customers money for this type of upgrade, upwards of 50% of the cost to install ITC Coatings. We do not just sell ceramic coatings, we provide the customer with a complete engineered solution along with a total Btu savings analysis for each furnace we quote. Each Btu savings analysis is unique to that furnace and based on operational data supplied by the customer. We have also provided before and after thermal imaging of the furnace as proof that the heat transfer/loss through the refractory and to the shell is less, so you do not necessarily need totalizing meters to prove energy savings.

If you would like to learn more about ITC Coatings and our technology, I encourage you to contact me and discuss this topic in greater detail.

Regards,

Greg Odenthal

Director of Engineering & Technical Operations

ITC| International Technical Ceramics, LLC

We welcome your inquiries to and feedback on Heat Treat Today articles. Submit your questions/comments to editor@heattreattoday.com.

Reader Feedback: On Ceramic Coatings Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #12: ITC Coatings

September 6, 2018 / HEAT TREAT NEWS INDUSTRIES, HEAT TREAT RADIO

Audio: Heat Treat Radio: ITC Coatings

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, interviews Greg Odenthal of ITC Coatings, a company based in Fort Worth, Texas, which manufactures and installs high-temperature, energy-efficient ceramic coatings. Increasing the efficiency of your furnace by even 5 to 10 percent would a good thing. Doug and Greg are going to introduce you to a spray-on product that increases furnace efficiency by, on average, 10 to 15 percent and sometimes as high as 25 percent. It can be applied to nearly any furnace surface and can be applied in less than a week in most cases, sometimes even within a single day.

Click the play button below to listen.

Transcript: Heat Treat Radio: ITC Coatings

The following transcript has been edited for your reading enjoyment.

Thanks for joining us. I’m Doug Glenn, your Heat Treat Radio host and publisher of Heat Treat Today. Before we jump on the phone and call Greg Odenthal at ITC Coatings, let me encourage you to visit www.heattreattoday.com, especially if you’re a manufacturer with in-house heat treat operations. Our website targets content for heat treaters in the aerospace, automotive, medical, and energy sectors well as general manufacturing. We update the site with at least one new piece of content every weekday, and we typically publish technical content on Tuesdays, our Technical Tuesday feature.

So let’s get rolling on today’s podcast. I got on the phone and called Greg Odenthal. Greg is the director of engineering and technical applications for ITC Coatings. Let’s jump right into the phone call.

Doug Glenn (DG): So, this is Doug Glenn with Heat Treat Radio. We’re here today, on the phone, with Greg Odenthal from ITC Coatings. So, we wanted to talk about a relatively interesting, not necessarily new, but perhaps new to many captive heat treaters and many heat treaters in the industry. It has to do with helping the insulating properties of furnaces and things of that sort. So, let’s start. First thing I want to do is welcome Greg. Greg, thanks for joining us, I appreciate you being here.

Greg Odenthal (GO): Thanks, Doug. I appreciate it. It is good to be here.

DG: So, without a lot of detail at this point, because we’ll get into a little more detail as we move forward, if you could give us the thirty-second elevator pitch on the product. And maybe as you are doing it, just tell us a bit about the company: the company name, where you are located, that type of thing.

GO: Sure thing. So it is ITC Coatings. We are located in Fort Worth, Texas. I sit in my office in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and we also have a business development office in Raleigh, North Carolina. So, we manufacture and install high-temperature, energy-efficient ceramic coatings. These coatings have a multitude of uses in heat treat furnaces, kilns, reheat furnaces in the steel world. And really, anybody who is looking to reduce fuel consumption, reduce factory maintenance, increase product quality, should be looking at using our products.

What is it? Water-Based Ceramic Coatings

Greg Odenthal, Director of Engineering & Technical Operations ITC – International Technical Ceramics, LLC (ITC Coatings)

DG: Right. So, it is an energy saving product. It is applied to refractories. Without giving away the secret sauce, because we know there is a secret formula, give us a sense of what we are dealing with here. Is it a castable material? Is it a wool material? Is it a spray-on material? What is it? What is it made of? How does it work?

GO: Well, it’s neither of those. It is ceramic technology, and it’s ceramic coatings. These are water-based ceramic coatings that are applied only mils thick on top of a current existing refractory. That refractory can be castable, gunite, shotcrete, ceramic fiber, fire brick, insulating fire brick, hard brick — it has a multitude of uses. Unfortunately, at this point, I cannot disclose the chemical makeup because it is proprietary. But I will tell you that there is nothing in our coatings that one wouldn’t find in any of the current refractories in use today.

DG: So you are not introducing some sort of a strange, alien substance into the furnace, necessarily. It’s just normal material but it is formulated in such a way that you can get some pretty outstanding energy efficiencies.

GO: Absolutely. We take what’s currently being used in the market and based on percentages and what we have, we make a pretty unique product.

DG: A lot of people will say, well, this is a brand new product; if we buy it, if we use it, are we going to be the guinea pigs here? Tell us a little bit. What is the history? Has it been around a long time? Is it relatively new?

GO: Our product has been around since 1980. There was a gentleman and his wife, Feriz Delkic and Alice Delkic, that invented this product. They invented it for their own use. Ferris was manufacturing kilns back in the 1980s. He wanted his kilns to be the most efficient kilns on the market. So, in order to do that, he invented a ceramic coating to apply to the inside of the kiln over top of the refractory. And, low and behold, come to find out that now his kilns are the most efficient kilns on the market. Having that technology in his pocket, he kind of ventured out and tried to persuade or get the world to start using his coatings to reduce fuel consumption, increase product quality, [along with] a host of benefits that come along with it. We can talk about it a little later. So, yes, it has been around since 1980. It’s nothing new to the market. But, like you had made mention at the beginning of the interview, it’s probably new to quite a few people because if you never heard of it or you don’t realize what’s on the market, then, yes, it could be a new product.

The Savings

DG: Right. And just so we know — I mean, we’ll mention this at the end as well — people can find out a little bit more on your website: www.itccoatings.com. We will mention that again at the end. So, Greg, realistically, what type of energy savings are we talking about? You can give us low end, extremely great high end. But realistically what’s in the middle as well? What are you seeing as far as energy savings?

GO: Depending upon the application and depending upon the condition of the refractory, we’ve seen energy savings anywhere from 7 to 10 percent all the way up to 20 to 25 percent reductions in fuel consumption. Because of the broad range, you know, if I’m going in and I’m applying this coating on a brand new refractory lining, say it’s brand new fiber lining or even a brand new brick lining – that refractory is pretty intact. Obviously, it’s new. You don’t have a lot of spalled refractory or cracks or things of that nature so your fuel consumption at that point is low to begin with. The coatings at that point on a new lining are going to protect that refractory from the harmful effects of heat and thermal shock and spalling. It will increase its life. When you get into a lining that has been around for several years and it’s got a lot of wear on it, a lot of spalling, thermal cracking shocks, things of that nature, you’ve got a lot of avenues for heat to penetrate into that lining and escape through the shell. So, obviously, your fuel consumption is much greater. There is a broad range, but like I said, it depends upon the application and current condition of the refractory.

DG: So, roughly speaking, a person that was going to use it could expect anywhere from 10 to 25 percent, 7 to 25 percent. Somewhere in that range?

GO: Yeah, I would say the average that we see currently today on installations is anywhere from 10 to 15 percent. On an average.

DG: That’s fair. And the way this works, just so we’re clear – it’s a reflective material. Is that right? I mean, essentially, is that how we are saving?

GO: Yes, yes, it is. It reflects probably about 90 percent of all the radiant energy that the burners put out.

DG: Right. And it’s most effective in the radiant spectrum, so to speak?

GO: Absolutely. When you get into the radiation, into the temperatures that most of our customers and our target audiences are operating at – when you are at 1200 degrees, 1500 degrees, the major mode of heat transfer is radiation which [is] temperature to the fourth power, that’s what we are after. We’re after re-radiating from the burners back into the furnace to capture that energy and reduce your fuel consumption. You know, you still get convection and conduction through coatings. That heat transfer still takes place, but at much lower temperatures and we aren’t really concerned about it. It’s the radiation spectrum that we’re after.

Application — DIY or Letting the Pros Handle It?

DG: So, just to kind of prep you and prep the people who are listening about what we are going to be talking about – we are going to talk in a minute about applying the product, and what does it take, dry out times, if any, and surface prep and stuff like that. But before I ask you about that, just to kind of whet our appetite here – do you have any good examples of installations, kind of case studies, that you could share, that might be of interest?

GO: We do have several listed on our website. I encourage listeners, obviously, to go to our website. We’ve had many successful applications over the years. One of the latest that we’ve just done here probably four or five months ago was McConway & Torley here in Pittsburgh in one of their austenitizing furnaces where we coated the entire ceramic fiber lining. Their major reason for using the coatings was they wanted to be able to reduce their turnaround time. And we did – by twenty minutes! Which now allows them to treat one additional load per week. It may not seem a lot but when you start applying the numbers and the savings to it, it’s pretty significant. So, one additional load per week for these guys is a significant amount of profit to their bottom line per year.

Along with that, like I said, which was one of the main reasons why they wanted to use this coating — we reduced their fuel consumption. We improved their temperature uniformity. You know, they were around plus or minus 40 degrees, we now have them down to plus or minus 25 degrees. So a big significant change there. Their refractory life is going to increase probably, and this is on an average as well, but their refractory longevity and life is going to increase three to five times. So, their maintenance on that fiber lining is going to greatly reduce. Fiber shrinks upon heat — it’s non-reversible. So you’ve got to shut the furnace down periodically and pack the joints with new fiber and continue running but the problem is the new fiber you just used to pack these joints as soon as you turn the furnace on the fiber shrinks. It’s just a constant maintenance nightmare, especially in a fiber-lined furnace. That was one of the latest that we did, but we have had numerous other applications throughout the years, specifically in the steel industry. We’ve got successful applications — ArcelorMittal, Nucor Steels, EVRAZ Rocky Mountain Steel in Colorado. And as far as heat treaters and forging houses — Finkl Steel in Chicago, Union Electric here in Pittsburgh. So we’ve got quite a laundry list of successful applications.

DG: All right, so let’s talk a little bit about application of the product. Just in a nutshell, what does it take to apply it? Is this a thermal spray? How do you apply it?

GO: It’s applied by spraying it on. It’s not thermal, thermally sprayed or applied. You know, the best way to apply it is — I tell a lot of our customers that want to do this themselves – the best way to apply it is to go to Home Depot or Lowes and buy yourself a textured drywall popper spray gun. You can get them for $70 or $80 and use that to apply it. It’s okay for heat treat furnaces that aren’t very large in size. We’ve done those that may be 32 feet long by 16 feet wide and 15 feet high — somewhere in that range. It’s okay in that size. When you move into a reheat furnace in a steel mill, there are sprayers that can be rented or purchased. They are also drywall spray guns, but they are self – contained with a 15-gallon hopper on the unit, so that the actual applicator is only holding onto a gun and not a hopper full of material. Which can get pretty heavy over time.

DG: Right. So it’s basically as simple as painting your house with a spray gun.

GO: Yeah, pretty much. You know some people will ask me, well I’ve got a paint sprayer here, can I use that? And the answer to that is “No.” Paint sprayers have filters and screens in them, and the problem is you’re going to filter out and screen out all of the ceramics that are in it, so, really all you’d be applying is the water that it’s mixed with.

DG: Okay, okay. So I assume you recommend that your team, your crew, applies it. It can be done by the homeowner, so to speak — the furnace owner — but probably better if your guys apply it?

GO: I would say initially, “Yes.” We always want to come in and do the first one, two, three applications for a customer. And during those applications, if they want to learn, they are more than welcome to sit there with us while we mix and apply so that they could get a good general knowledge and hands-on training at the time, to be able to move forward and apply it themselves. We do have some certified product installers around the country: NorHeat Treatment, Inc, out of Canada, Thermal Coating Solutions here in Pittsburgh. We do have some other people down south that do it for us. We have a gentleman over in Chicago that handles more or less our cement world and energy world, but, yeah, so, it can be applied by the customer but we definitely recommend ITC do the first one or two installs. Then you can learn the ropes.

Prep, Downtime, Restart

DG: Right. Now, how about surface preparation? So, I’m a, I’m a manufacturer, I’ve got a furnace in-house. It is up and running 24/7/365. I don’t want it to be down long. How much surface prep do I have to do if I take this thing out of service? How long is it out, and what do I need to do to get the surface ready, and how long, in fact, does installation and or any dry-out process take?

GO: Well, again, I’ve been in some furnaces that are in really, really bad shape. So, surface prep, on a ceramic fiber-lined furnace — depending on how hard you run it, the fiber starts to devitrify and it gets the black crusty layer over that fiber which is really no good anymore. It’s just a glassy phase that has no insulating value to you whatsoever. So, that needs to be removed. It’s depending on the size of the furnace, depending on the size of the crew, but most installations that I have been involved with – three to four days at the most. And that can even apply to a large pusher type reheat furnace in a steel mill. You know, day one would be surface prep, clean up the refractory if it needs it. Days two, three, and four would be applying the coatings. And then after that, we are done. We get out of the way. If you’ve got a brand new furnace, we can walk in, open the door, and we can have that sprayed in eight to ten hours. You can have that done in one day. Like I said, application really depends on the condition of the refractory.

DG: Right. And as far as dry out, I mean a lot of times with a refractory installation, there’s dry out times, that type of stuff. What are we looking at? Does this stuff have to be dried out? Do we need to go low heat for quite a while or does it dry like paint?

GO: Once it’s applied, the recommendation is to let it dry for 24 hours. And, then, when you start the furnace, I say, 100 degrees an hour, when you get to about 250 or 300, I like to hold it there, maybe for an hour, just to start to drive that mechanical water out of it. And then after that, 100 degrees an hour to operating temperature because then you are going to start forming the chemical bond and drive off the chemical water. You are going to sinter that coating. And you have to remember, these are only mils thick, so it’s not like conventional refractories where you’ve got 8, 9, 10 inches, and you’ve got to hold per hour, per inch thickness at 250, and then 600 and then 9 . . . You know there’s no holds just due to the thinness of the application.

The Fine Print

DG: Okay, so once we put the ITC coating on, and we’re getting ready to fire up the furnace, do we have any concerns about any volatiles, any type of dangerous chemicals going to be off-gassing during that process or during the life of the product?

GO: Absolutely not. The coatings contain no harmful VOCs. So there is no off-gassing, and they’re not harmful to you or the environment. So, no, no volatiles.

DG: So, the other question that jumps to my mind is – you know every material has a different thermal coefficient of expansion when it heats up. It grows or shrinks in a different way. So, you are applying this mils-thin coating/surface over — you can put it over brick, you can put it over fiber. When they heat up, grow and expand and contract differently. Do we have issues here with this coating here cracking/spalling, that type of thing, because of the base material?

GO: No, we do not. The way the coatings are designed, the binder system is designed to move with the dimensional change of the substrate. When you’re at ambient temperature, they are very hard — like a coffee cup if you think about ceramics. But when you get into the 2200 degree/2300 degree range, you know everything at that point starts to soften up a bit – things grow and move. The binder system in the coatings allows the coatings to move with the dimensional change of the substrate. So, no, we do not really have any issues with expansion. And that holds true for metal as well. We’ve got a coating that is specifically designed to coat metal parts and increase the life of metal parts due to high-temperature oxidation of the metal.

DG: Okay. And how about, along the same line, I’m thinking that if there is any type of cracking at all — which sounds like there is not — but in some of these furnaces, especially if we’ve got high-velocity air flow inside of let’s say, for example, some sort of an annealing furnace that just requires high convective heat, a lot of airflow, a lot of velocity. Do we have any concerns about wind erosion so to speak?

GO: No, not necessarily. You know, if you’ve got high velocity, some furnaces do have a fiber lining in them with some velocity, and it tends to sometimes tear the fiber off, but once the coatings are applied, you’re encapsulating that fiber. And again, like I said, it’s got a hard shell to it. So, no, any velocity we are not really too concerned about velocity.

DG: It wouldn’t be an issue. Very briefly then, let’s just talk about what products are offered. I was looking through the website, [and it] looks like you’ve got three new install products if you will, and two fix it products. Can you just kind of run us down through those — what ‘s the difference between them, all that good stuff?

The Line-Up

GO: Sure, sure. So, you are right. We’ve got five products that we offer. Our workhorse product that can go over top of any kind of refractory – it’s very versatile high-temperature coating and it’s proven to achieve outstanding energy savings and refractory protection. That is our ITC100HT. Next is the ITC296A; that is a high purity top coat. It is resistant to salts, acidics – anywhere you have a very strange atmosphere or bad products of combustion. Some of our customers burn oil or they burn coke oven gas which develops vanadium and that vanadium starts to attack the refractory linings. So, in that instance, I would apply the 296A over top of the ITC100 to prevent any additional chemical attack to the 100HT. After that, we have ITC213 which is our coating for metals. It is specifically formulated for metal surfaces. And that can go over top of carbon steel, stainless steels, alloys, you know any type of metal surface. And what it does is, we’re preventing the erosion of that metal due to oxidation at high temperatures. There is a surface prep to the metal. Most metal we are going to put it over, unless it is brand new, and even brand new metal a lot of times you’ll have oils or machine grease from manufacturing. That all needs to be removed and the best way to do that is sandblast. Sandblast the part, put a very nice profile on it, and then apply the coatings.

DG: I see this also can be applied on graphite.

GO: You know, it can, depending upon how much graphite is actually in the product. On mag-carbon brick, we have a very hard time applying it do to the high percentage of graphite in the mag carbon brick. We can coat electrodes, so, it just depends on the percentage of graphite.

DG: Okay. So that’s 213?

GO: That’s 213. And then, after that, we have two repair products that are trowelable-consistency materials. And these are used, ITC200EZ and ITC148, [for] heavy-duty ceramic repairs. The 200 EZ is used mostly in the ceramics and pottery world. It’s a durable compound used to repair broken, chipped, cracked brick, castable fiber material – things of that nature. ITC148 heavy duty; you’ll find this in use where we’ve got a lot of abrasion — heavy industry like the steel mills. Guys will repair ladle lip rings. They’ll repair deltas sometimes for an EAF furnace. It’s very strong, And it’s got an abrasion resistant compound for repairing areas that are exposed to harsh environments and mechanical abuse. You know, like I said — ton issues, ladles, door jams on furnaces — things of that nature.

DG: Okay. So those are the two repair products. And I do see from looking at your website right now that you do actually have install kits and things of that sort so that you can buy the product and you can also buy some of the equipment necessary for installing.

GO: Yes, we do. Those kits, again, are geared toward the hobbyists, the smaller ceramics guys. You know when you get into the manufacturing world, you are going to want a much bigger, heavy-duty sprayer. But, we do. We do offer kits to the smaller hobbyists and ceramic people.

DG: It might be worth saying that for some heat treaters who want to get started, who want to test this out on one of their smaller box furnaces, one of these kits may be a good way to start. Some of the bigger furnaces would be worth doing, too.

Okay, wrapping up here just shortly, any temperature range that this is not good in? I think you mentioned it’s okay for those lower temperature ranges, but it starts getting really effective when you are in the radiant heat spectrum. Any heat too high?

GO: No, not really that I have come across. You know the sweet spot on our bat is anywhere from 1600/1700 anywhere upwards of 3600/3800. You get into the medical waste incineration at those temperatures. You know, back in the day when Feriz was the original inventor, when he was out pushing his product, there had been testing in some product applications on the launchpad at NASA. So, I’m not exactly sure what the exit velocity and temperature of the combustion coming out of the rocket is, but I’m sure it’s pretty high and a pretty high velocity. He coated some of the process piping on the launch pad. Not that I have run into any temperatures that are too high for us. Again, the sweet spot on our bat, anywhere from 1600 to 3600s is not an issue.

DG: Well, safe to say, if our heat treaters are experiencing the temperatures and velocities of a NASA launchpad, we might want to talk to them about their process a little bit.

GO: I would think they would have a bigger problem than refractories.

DG: Yeah, exactly. Alright, super, so the last couple things I see that I wanted to mention here are, first off, these materials, most of them you can buy in gallons, or even pint sizes. I guess a lot of them come in different sizes, correct?

GO: We package it in pint sizes for the smaller hobbyist and smaller home kiln heat treater and knife makers, and then for when you get into the industry, we’ve got it in gallon containers and five-gallon containers.

DG: Okay, super. And then I also noticed, very nice to see, by the way, let me compliment you on this, I see your website is e-commerce friendly. So, people can actually go on and buy right online, I assume.

GO: You can buy right off our website. All of the information is listed there. You can buy with a credit card, or you can even go to the website.We do have what is listed as office@ITCCoatings if you are using a PO. You can go to that email and submit a PO for materials. So there are several ways to buy the product.

DG: Okay, so if you want to send an email, office@ITCcoatings.com will also get you there. Very good. How about, just as a reminder, website to find out more is www.itccoatings.com. With an S. You could take a look there. Also, Heat Treat Today will have an article on our site as well at www.heattreattoday.com. Be glad to connect you up with Greg. Well, if anybody has any questions and you would like to get a hold of Greg directly, just email me at doug@heattreattoday.com. Be glad to put you in touch with Greg if you have more questions. So, Greg, thanks a lot for the time. I appreciate it. If there is anything you want to add before we sign off?

GO: No, I think we covered quite a bit today. I appreciate you having me. Thank you very much. It was enjoyable.

So if you’re looking for a way to increase the thermal efficiency of your furnace, maybe as much as 10 to 15 percent, why not give Greg a call? Again, drop me an email at doug@heattreattoday.com if you’d like to get in touch with Greg.

You can listen to other Heat Treat Radio podcasts by doing one of three things. You can go to The Google and search for Heat Treat Radio, we’re the first thing that pops up. Or, you can go to www.heattreattoday.com and click on Heat Treat Radio under the Resources Tab. OR, you can go to iTunes or SoundCloud and search for us there.

If you have a topic you’d like to see featured on Heat Treat Radio, please drop me an email.

Heat Treat Radio is the sole property of Heat Treat Today and may not be reproduced without specific, written approval and appropriate attribution.

This issue of Heat Treat Radio was mixed and produced by Jonathan Lloyd, Butler, Pennsylvania.

I’m your host, Doug Glenn. Thanks for listening.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #12: ITC Coatings Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #11: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard

August 25, 2018 / HEAT TREAT RADIO, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT NEWS, UNCATEGORIZED

Audio: Heat Treat Radio: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, interviews two families who have been at their manufacturing game for multiple generations. Not long ago they joined forces to establish a new company — Laser Hard, Inc. — and to introduce one of the most cutting edge-heat treat technologies around today: laser heat treating. For many of you who have difficult-to-heat treat parts, whether it’s because of blind holes, or the fact that the part is too big to move, or perhaps you’d like to significantly reduce, if not eliminate, post-heat treat hard machining, you’re going to find today’s Heat Treat Radio episode on laser heat treating especially interesting.

Click the play button below to listen.

Transcript: Heat Treat Radio: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard

The following transcript has been edited for your reading enjoyment.

Click the image to connect to Heat Treat Radio

In this episode of Heat Treat Radio, let’s talk about one of the most cutting-edge heat treat technologies around today — laser heat treating.

Thanks for joining us. My name is Doug Glenn and I’m your Heat Treat Radio host and publisher of Heat Treat Today. You can find us on the web at www.heattreattoday.com or simply by Googling Heat Treat Radio. And here’s something new, Heat Treat Radio is now on iTunes! On the website, we update our heat treat content daily, and if you’re a manufacturer with an in-house heat treat department, you’re going to love our site.

Although it sounds Star Treky, laser heat treating is a pretty well-established technology, especially in Europe, but not so much in the United States. The applications are intriguing to say the least – as is the way it is being introduced into the United States – and as are the two families introducing it. One family – long time heat treaters. The other family – long time laser welders and laser cladders. Both minding their own businesses – literally – both thinking about ways to better serve their customers. These two businessmen were from the same small town in Pennsylvania, and they paired up to create a new company called Laser Hard.

And that’s where our story begins.

Introducing Doug Peters of Peters’ Heat Treating and Blair Learn of Phoenix Laser Solutions

Doug Glenn (DG): First, let me introduce you to the two patriarchs: Doug Peters of Peters’ Heat Treating, and Blair Learn of Phoenix Laser Solutions.

Both Doug and Blair are seasoned veterans in their respective industries, and both have children involved in their family businesses in Meadville, Pennsylvania – a mid-sized city about 40 minutes south of Lake Erie and 20 miles from the Ohio state border. These two patriarchs have known each other for years – primarily because Phoenix Laser had been sending heat treating to Peters’ Heat Treating.

Peters’ Heat Treating started in 1979, and here’s Doug Peters with a short history of Peters’ Heat Treating.

Doug Peters (DP): We basically started because there was a need in the area for a commercial heat treater. I heard about it from clients of mine. I was in the insurance business and I finally got tired of listening to everybody saying that the place needed a good heat treater so we started one. That expanded to Erie in ’82, then opened the production plant on 13 acres up here in 2013.

Doug and his wife Jackie have three kids involved in their business: Christopher, who helps with IT and other special projects at the heat treat company, and then husband and wife team Diana Peters Wilkosz and her husband Andy Wilkosz who are both heavily involved in Laser Hard as well as the heat treat company.

The other patriarch in this picture is Blair Learn, father of three boys, Chris, Dave, and Mike, all of whom are owners of Phoenix Laser Solutions. Here’s Blair with a brief history of his family business.

Blair Learn (BL): So we started here in 2008, but we’ve been laser welding for 25 years. We used to have a design and build plastic injection mold hut. We would build high cavitation molds, and we needed a laser there to fix the day-to-day bumps and dings — you know, DCRs and stuff.

Besides the laser heat treating technology, which we’ll get to in just a minute, the thing that excites these two seasoned entrepreneurs is seeing their 20- and 30-something kids run with a new business. Doug Peters says it well.

DP: I think one of the things that’s most interesting to me is that the two patriarchs have stepped back and this company truly belongs to our sons and daughters.

DG: And who are these sons and daughters? Well, there are more than we have time to put in this podcast, but let me introduce them all to you now and then we’ll hear from just two of them.

Introducing Chris Learn and Andy Wilkosz of LaserHard, Inc.

Laser Hard, Inc:: Andy Wilkosz, Diana Wilkosz, Chris Learn, David Learn

On the Peters’ Heat Treating side of the business is, as I mentioned before, Diana Wilkosz, maiden name, Peters. Diana is the marketing brains behind Laser Hard and oversees marketing, HR, and finance for Peters’ Heat Treating. This is a good time to mention that Laser Hard can be found on the web at www.laserhard.com, a website undoubtedly put together by Diana and her team.

We’ll hear from Diana’s husband, Andy Wilkosz, in just a few minutes.

From the Phoenix Laser Solutions side of the business is two of the three brothers, Chris and Dave Learn. Dave is treasurer and Chris is president. Both of the patriarchs, Doug Peters and Blair Learn, are heavily involved in sales and oversight of the new company.

Now, let’s hear from Chris Learn.

Chris Learn (CL): Yeah, my name is Chris Learn. I’m the owner of Phoenix Laser. And I pretty much oversee the shop floor. Mainly on the laser welding side.

DG: And now, as promised, let’s hear from the spokesperson from the Peters’ Heat Treating side of the business – Andy Wilkosz.

Andy Wilkosz (AW): I’m Andy Wilkosz, vice president of Laser Hard. I also work for Peters’ Heat Treat.

DG: So these are the players. But what about the technology – laser heat treating. Pretty fascinating stuff. Listen as we go back to Andy as he discusses cutting-edge robotics and real-time, feedback-loop pyrometry that makes this laser heat treating system so much different AND BETTER than other laser heat treating systems.

AW: So, I was part of the team that worked on initial startup and all the initial projects associated with the robot and the laser system. Some of the things that set it apart from the traditional lasers and systems that are out in the marketplace now is this has the Fonhoffer Control System so there is onboard optical pyrometry which is a very strong tool for this. A traditional laser is almost like a guess-and-check type of method where you adjust the wattage, see if you achieved the hardness, and in this system, we have the optical pyrometry that has a feedback loop that reads the temperature of the part and then it can control which is really important as a part’s geometry changes. We are going to be able to have better repeatability and control for our customers’ parts. Now, obviously it’s always best if you get one set up part but if the customer just has one part, we are much more likely to get it right and not hurt their part with some of the hazards that could be associated with laser-like melting.

DG: Doug Peters expounded as well on some of the advantages of the Laser Hard heat treating system.

DP: You can locally heat treat parting lines. You can locally heat treat shear areas in a cut off die. You can, instead of having to heat treat the whole part — basically the strength, Doug, is that you can finish a part, we can locally heat treat and then you can put it to work. So the precise heat of a laser enables us to not have to temper everything. In Europe, as they employ this technology, they don’t temper much, if anything because they don’t need to, because of the way this works. Right now I can tell you that the main strength I see in this thing is the precise placement of the treatment, whether it be cladding or heat treating, and the areas that we can direct the beam that you cannot get at with any other technology or method of heating. So, in other words, if you have a blind hole that is two inches deep, I can put a beam into the bottom of the hole and I can harden just the bottom of the hole, and you can’t do that with induction or flame. And with traditional heat treating you are going to have the hard finish cost associated with the distortion as part of the base heat treating cycle.

DG: With laser, you can get in the hole, do the job, and be done with no additional post treatments.

DP: Exactly. And no post hard finish time either — which is huge. The majority of time in building a tool is generally in hard finish time.

DG: And finally, Chris Learn also had something to say about the advantages and application of laser hardening. Chris Learn…

CL: It’s heavily being used in the automotive industry for very large plastic injection tools. So they got this very large plastic injection cavity or core and they are just locally heat treating the parting line and the shut offs. Where before they would have to buy a more expensive material and you know, rough machine it, then heat treat the entire huge block and then finish machine it, you know, with hard milling or eem processes that are very expensive, where now they can just buy a cheaper material, finish machine it and then laser harden just the part you need.

Portability

One of the other benefits of this new laser heat treating service being offered by Laser Hard is its portability. Andy Wilkosz commented on the unit’s portability and its potential application in the gear market.

AW: Another powerful aspect of this is we are hoping to really serve the gear market as well. Where in traditional heat treating, what you run is going to be limited on your furnace size. With this robot having the ability to move around — it’s on tank treads — and the range that it can articulate to, you are only limited by what you can get to. So we have the ability to do very, very large parts.

DG: I don’t know if you caught what Andy said. He said that the laser heat treating unit was on “tank treads.” Those tank treads along with a robotic laser heat treating or cladding arm allow the unit to move on-site to where the part is located and once there to move around the part as needed to do whatever process needs done whether it be heat treating or cladding.

As we left the Laser Hard offices and went into the shop to see the unit in action, I asked Chris Learn about the unit’s mobility as well – the ability to take that machine on-site.

CL: So I think the biggest reason for taking this piece of equipment mobile is if the workpiece is too large to transport. Or if it’s too expensive and too risky to transport. So, it’s a very high-cost situation that instead of taking the part here and having us manipulate it here at our shop, even though we have a ten-ton crane, some parts that we deal with are twenty tons, thirty tons. So, it’s a size restriction. Sometimes it’s going to make sense to take this on site.

DG: I next asked Andy to give us a brief explanation of how the unit works. Here’s Andy, and again, please pardon the background noise from the laser welding shop.

AW: Right now, we have a part chucked up in the rotary axis and with the laser scan technology that we have on the laser, it interfaces with the software on the computer and what Mason can do is, we’ll rotate the part, as he rotates the part, it requires image information through the scan and it will actually build a 3D model of the part and its geometry on the computer. Then once we have that on the computer, we can use the computer to draw and program the path of the heat treat or the laser hardening pattern – whether it be a spot or in this case it’s a round bar and what we are going to do is we are going to traverse the bar in a spiral candy cane/barber pole pattern so that you can harden the entire surface. The beam size is about, the max width is, we’ll say 850,000, it’s a little bit more than that but we’ll use round numbers. So if you want to harden an area larger than that, what you end up doing is making multiple overlapping passes.

DG: To actually see the equipment in action, you’ll have to link over to Heat Treat Today’s website and search for Laser Hard. We’ll have an article there with photos of the players and a brief video of the laser heat treating system in action.

Click below or here to view a video of the equipment in action.

Here’s what’s important to remember:

This laser heat treating and cladding system has a real-time feedback loop that makes it possible to not guess at whether the heat treating process being run is being run correctly.
This laser heat treating and cladding system is portable and can go on-site to perform any process needed.
For large parts or for specialty parts where shipping is problematic, this laser heat treating system may be just the ticket you’ve been looking for.

The young team at Laser Hard, backed by the two industry veterans, are bringing an innovative new heat treating technology to the United States.

If you’re interested in knowing more about Laser Hard and the services they provide, feel free to visit their website at www.laserhard.com or contact me directly and I’ll put you in touch with one of the key players. More information, including photos of the Laser Hard team and the equipment, as well as a short video of the equipment in use, can be seen by visiting Heat Treat Today’s website and searching for Laser Hard.

Stop back at Heat Treat Today’s site frequently. We update the site daily with information pertinent to heat treaters with in-house heat treating departments, especially those in the aerospace, automotive, medical, and energy sectors, as well as general manufacturing.

If you’d like to hear more Heat Treat Radio, you can do that in one of three ways:

You can Google “heat treat radio” – we’re the first thing that pops up,
You can visit www.heattreattoday.com and find “Heat Treat Radio” under the Resources tab,
Or, as I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, you can find “Heat Treat Radio” on iTunes or on SoundCloud.

If you have a specific topic you’d like covered on Heat Treat Radio, please feel free to contact me directly with your suggestion. My email is doug@heattreattoday.com.

Heat Treat Radio podcasts are the sole property of Heat Treat Today and cannot be reproduced without permission and appropriate attribution.

This episode of Heat Treat Radio was produced and mixed by Jonathan Lloyd, Butler, Pennsylvania.

My name is Doug Glenn. Thanks for joining us.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #11: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #10: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters

July 12, 2018 / HEAT TREAT NEWS INDUSTRIES, HEAT TREAT RADIO, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT NEWS

Audio: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, tours Euclid Heat Treating Company with owner John Vanas and discusses a nano-technology parts washing solution.

Click the play button below to listen.

Transcript: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters

The following transcript has been edited for your reading enjoyment.

If you’re a manufacturer and you use parts washers to remove oil residue from metal parts as part of your manufacturing process, or if you’re a commercial heat treater who washes parts, today’s Heat Treat Radio episode should be especially interesting to you. Why? If you thought there was nothing new in the parts washing arena, you’ll be shocked at what you’ll learn today. Let me whet your appetite. What if I told you there is a parts washing additive out there where you only had to add .3 ounces — that’s right, .3 ounces — to every gallon of wash water? And what if I told you that you could run that solution for 3 to 4 months without adding any chemicals? And what would you say if I told you that the oil skimmed off of your wash bath would have a lower water content than anything that you’re currently using? And what would you say if I told you your maintenance team would never have to check the concentrations of your wash water again? Not enough? Okay, let me give you one more. What if I told you that when you were done with the bath, you could just dump it down the drain?
Sounds too good to be true, right? Well, buckle up, because Heat Treat Today is going to take you where no heat treat washing system has ever gone before.

For today’s episode of Heat Treat Radio, your host, that’s me, Doug Glenn (I’m also the publisher of Heat Treat Today, which you can find on the web at www.heattreattoday.com), took a road trip to Euclid, Ohio, to visit with a current user of the wonder wash additive I just described to you. It was a rainy day, so any raindrop noises you hear are, in fact, raindrops.

John Vanas (JV): This is our rotary retort building.

Doug Glenn (DG): Ok, great.

JV: And this is Euclid Heat Treating Company. I am John Vanas. It was established in 1946 by my father. So we have been around for 72 years.

DG: 72?

JV: 72 years. I have been here 46 years.

DG: And it is a family business, right?

JV: Yes, a family business. I have got three kids working here and we are probably the most diverse commercial heat treater in this area. We do a lot of different things: induction, rotary retort, batch, pit, nitriding, ferritic nitrocarburizing, and intensive quenching. We have got quite a bit of different processes that we do.

John and I are on a walking tour of his six-building commercial heat treat complex just northeast of Cleveland, Ohio. As he mentioned, Euclid Heat Treat Company is no fly-by-night establishment. John’s dad started the business and has passed it down to John who is well on his way to passing it on to his kids. Before we jump into the specifics of the “wonder wash” additive, which by the way, is not the name of the product — it is called SX Oil Lifter — but before we jump into the specifics of that additive, here is a bit more about the family business.

DG: So you got it from your dad?

JV: Yes.

DG: Roughly, when?

JV: Actually he passed in 1991. I have been running it since 1974. We had a general manager who ran the plant and he passed away, so they threw it to me. I was here for two years and my dad said, “It’s your baby. I am going to Florida.” So, that’s alright.

DG: And you have three kids?

John Vanas’ children: Deidre, John, and Claudine

JV: Three kids.

DG: Which are Deidre, John ….

JV: ….. and Claudine. They work here. John runs production, Deidre is going to be the General Manager, pretty much, and Claudine does the finance work. And I just try to keep everybody in line.

The Plant Floor: Where the Magic Happens

John and I were standing at the entrance of his rotary retort building, as I mentioned, one of the six buildings, located just off of 222nd Street in Euclid. As we were working our way to washer end of one of his rotary retort furnace lines, John explained the markets he serves with these furnaces.

JV: Two rotaries we’ve got an AGF 139 and an 1814, so this is a large retort that quenches into polymer and this one quenches into oil and goes right through the wash and out the other end to the finished product. Not too many people do rotary work anymore. There are a few of us around, but the beauty of this is the parts tumble and they get even case all over where with a belt furnace they mask each other by laying on each other, so it’s a good technology. Kind of a niche market for us.

DG: So it’s primarily fasteners?

JV: Fasteners, little stampings, just a little bit of everything. You can see here these are actually plugs for automobile and truck oil pans. We do a ton of these things. There’s a little stamping here that we’re running. You name it, if you have to have even case hardness we can do it in these two furnaces.

We then moved our way to the discharge shoot at the back end of the first rotary retort furnace where parts fell into an oil quench and then on into a spray washer. John wanted me to see that the oil being pulled out of the washing solution was almost 100% pure oil; very little, if any water. Here’s how John tells it:

JV: So we load through the retort into the oil quench then into a wash. This is a spray washer. Then we’ve got one of these hula hoop type tooth skimmers that skim the oil off into this drum. If you can see that; that’s almost pure oil. This is the XS Oil Lifter in here. But that’s almost pure oil. There is no water in there.

A heat treat washer solution that minimizes waste and maximizes green

We spent a few more minutes discussing John’s rotary retort lines and the washers associated with it, including a disc skimmer and another bucket of, as John describes it, “pure oil — there’s no water in there.” The point being, there is a cost savings when you send this oil out to be processed since there is very little water in the oil.

We next walked by Euclid’s intensive quench system which is essentially an IQ furnace sitting on top of an 11,000-gallon quench tank. Euclid’s intensive quench capabilities is another unique offering for the company.

From Skepticism to New Product Line

After leaving the intensive quench and rotary retort building, we got into the meat of our conversation as we walked in the rain between buildings. The wonder-wash additive which I mentioned, called SX Oil Lifter, I asked John to tell me a bit more about that product.

DG: So John, one of the reasons I came over is we want to talk about this SX Oil Lifter.

JV: Yes, this is a new product that was introduced to me, and I tried it just on a whim because I didn’t think it was going to work in a small wash that we’re going to see over here in one of our other buildings. And it worked so well, I’ve got it now in six washers.

DG: Maybe before we go back into the noise of the building, it was introduced to you by whom?

JV: Actually by a friend of Bill Lohn, he’s my partner. So we decided to give it a try. I put it in a washer and it worked so well that we put it in other washers. It lasts 3 to 4 months and then you change it. You never have to add anything to it, which is the beauty of it. And it just does a great job. So after 3 to 4 months, usually you get oil in the washer and up on the walls of the washer. It just gets kind of scummy. We’ve had some people use it and not change it for 6 months. It just depends on what you’re washing and how often you’re washing.

DG: Now, Bill found out about from who?

JV: He found out about it from a friend of his that was using it for another type of washing and they had initially had developed through industrial but no one was using it for that, so we negotiated with the company to get the license to do it by industrial type of washing. So now we’re the partners and we’re really the company for the industrial side. We’re trying to introduce it to the heat treating industry because once you try it, you’re going to like it.

Nano-Invasive Technology

DG: So just to be clear on it, it’s not a washer, it’s a chemical, but it’s not a chemical-chemical. It’s very biodegradable….

JV: It’s biodegradable. You can probably drink it. When you’re done with it, you can just put it down the drain. If you have oil that you haven’t skimmed off, you can let it settle out and drain it off that way, but most people just dump it right down the drain. There is nothing biologically harmful about it. There is nothing to harm the sewer. Our people test our sewers once a month here and they have found nothing. So that’s how we dispose of it, we just dump it down the drain.

DG: You were also mentioning about the quantity that you have to put in.

JV: Yes, it’s 3/10ths of a percent per gallon.

DG: So for a typical quench tank, what do you put in?

JV: Well this quench tank here has 750 gallons and I think we’re putting 80 ounces in there.

DG: And that 80 ounces will last you for 3 to 4 months, and maybe longer.

JV: Yes, then when you’re done, you dump it down the drain, clean it out and redo it.

DG: Ok, one other thing I wanted to ask. You said they call it “nano-invasive technology”?

JV: Yes, nano-invasive technology. What we found out is it does not actually dissolve in the water like your Tide or some other detergent or Simple Green. So, it’s in there and it’s lifting the oil, but it’s not dissolved in there, so when you’re dumping the fluid, you’re not dumping a dissolved chemical. And the fact that it is not dissolved, you don’t pull off that chemical you don’t have to add. You add water through your float valve, but you won’t add more product. The water evaporates, the product does not.

Seeing the Wonder Wash in Action

From there we went into the big batch building where three Super Allcases (a product of Surface Combustion) were located along with an older Lindberg IQ and a number of temper furnaces.

John showed me a batch wash that had just had the fluid changed the weekend prior, after 3 to 4 months of use. According to John, they probably could have gone longer, but that is the interval his maintenance team established to clean and change out the washing fluid. All the maintenance team did was wash down the inside of the washer and remove all the oil residue, skim off the oil from the top of the bath, and then dump the wash fluid down the drain. That’s it.

From the big batch building, we moved on to induction building.

JV: We have different stations and different power sources. We probably have about a dozen power sources and probably 40 different stations for doing different things. We’ve got a bolt machine there that he’s working on. We have a rotating machine there for different gears. We do a little bit of everything in here. We’ve got it crammed into the building pretty good. We just had this mezzanine put in and put the power sources up on top.

John’s father started the induction division. It was one of his special interests. John indicated that Euclid does a lot of work with local induction genius, as John describes him, Bill Stuehr of Induction Tooling out of North Royalton, Ohio, not far from Euclid.

The last building we entered was the vacuum and pit building.

JV: Here we have our vacuum equipment, our pit furnace, and our little batch furnace.

This building had about a dozen different vacuum and pit furnaces. After hitting this last building, we went back to talking a bit more about SX Oil Lifter and especially on the cost savings.

Pouring Savings into the Tank Instead of Down the Drain

DG: I assume there are cost savings here, right?

JV: Yes, it’s going to be about a third of what most people are using, from what we can determine. At least from what we used to use. We used to use a product from one of our oil suppliers and it would kinda make a funny-looking emulsion on the surface. And when we skimmed it off, we’d have to put it in the tank, let it settle out, drain it off until we got down to the oil and take the oil out. But we found out that we were getting a pretty good percentage of water in the oil when we sent it to the recycler. So he would charge us for getting the water out.

DG: So when you changed over the oil lifter, you didn’t have any problem with your current equipment that you used to separate the oil out I assume, right? There was no adverse effect?

JV: No, it was the same skimmer we always used, but it was just much more efficient.

DG: And you’re getting much better purity?

JV: Yes, we’re pretty much getting all oil in the tanks from the skimmers instead of an all water mixture.

When we walked back outside and headed back to John’s office, I asked him to repeat the cost savings information.

JV: It looks like from what we’ve seen from what our products we used to use, it’s going to be about a third.

DG: So you’re saving two-thirds?

JV: Yes. Plus, again, the beauty is, you don’t have to add all the time. You don’t have to have somebody coming in titrating. You can’t titrate this stuff. You can’t figure out what the percentage is because it’s such a small percentage, it doesn’t show up. We’ve tried several different methods to try to determine if we’ve got the right mix still in the tank, but we’ve come to the conclusion that you can’t. So, you put it in, you use it for 4 months or 3 months. When it starts to get to the point where perhaps it’s not cleaning the oil off well enough, you dump it and refill it.

DG: And you judge that not by taking any chemical composition of the solution, you just watch the parts, and if you’re seeing oil residue, it’s time to change.

JV: Exactly. And that kinda flies in the face of someone with technical knowledge, but that’s the way it works. You can tell if you’re washing off quench oil, if you start getting a smokey temper load, obviously you’ve got too much oil in there.

Once we got back to John’s office, I pressed him even more on the cost savings.

JV: We know the product we were using before was pretty expensive and I’ve talked to people who have tried and it and they said we’re putting a 55-gallon drum a month into our washer of the product we’re using now. And I said, well you won’t be doing that with SX Oil and I know that stuff is pretty expensive.

We further quantified the savings by talking about the money saved on oil processing because of less or no water in the oil being processed, plus the time savings of not having to test concentration levels of the wash. John had more to say about the time savings.

JV: Just talking to some other people who have tried the product, they said we’re going to save a lot of money because we have a guy who has to titrate it, has to add to it, and we don’t have to do that anymore.

DG: And they’re paying for that, I assume. They’re paying for that service or they’re paying one of their employees.

JV: Usually one of their employees. But it’s time-consuming and it’s a lab situation and titration. And with this, you don’t have to do anything.

I asked him if he had ever run into any problems with the product. He said that one customer called complaining the parts washed in the product were rusting faster than normal. After John and his fellow user discussed it for a while, they concluded that the product was doing such a good job of removing the oil from the surface, that it was more prone to rusting. What was the solution? John is working on adding a rust preventative to the product to help minimize the issue.

If it sounds too good to be true, it’s not. Here’s a brand new product. In fact, a brand new nanotechnology product, that

requires only .3 ounces per gallon of water,
lasts for 3-4 months minimum depending on your workload and oiliness of your products,
results in an almost pure oil skimming which minimizes oil reprocessing fees,
frees up your maintenance team to do other things besides worry about the washer,
and best of all, when you’re done, dump it down the drain.

If you’d like more information about SX Oil Lifter, please visit our website www.heattreattoday.com and search for SX Oil Lifter. We’ll have a full article about the product on the website along with a link to the product’s website. You can also email me directly if you’d like to get in touch with John Vanas at Euclid Heat Treat in Euclid, Ohio. My email address is doug@heattreattoday.com.

If you’d like more Heat Treat Radio, including our series on metallurgical poster children where we interview young, new metallurgical minds, please visit our website www.heattreattoday.com and click on Heat Treat Radio. Visit the website frequently. We post at least one heat treat news or technology item every weekday. Our content is targeted at manufacturers with in-house heat treat departments, especially in the aerospace, automotive, medical and energy sectors. Again, visit us at www.heattreattoday.com.

And finally, if you have a specific topic you’d like to see covered on Heat Treat Radio, please contact me directly at doug@heattreattoday.com.

Heat Treat Radio podcasts are the sole property of Heat Treat Today and cannot be reproduced without permission and appropriate attribution. This episode of Heat Treat Radio was produced and mixed by Jonathan Condon, Butler, Pennsylvania.

My name is Doug Glenn. Thanks for joining us.

To receive a copy of Euclid’s Safety Data Worksheet for SX Oil Lifter, contact Doug Glenn at doug@heattreattoday.com.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #10: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #9: Tom Morrison on Why Manufacturers Should Send Their Entire Heat Treat Team to FNA 2018

June 28, 2018 / HEAT TREAT RADIO, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT NEWS

Click the play button below to listen.

Metal Treating Institute CEO, Tom Morrison, talks with Heat Treat Today’s Doug Glenn about 2018’s largest heat treat event, Furnaces North America, which will be held in Indianapolis, Indiana, from October 8-10, 2018. Find out why manufacturers with in-house heat treat shops should not only attend FNA 2018, but why they should send the entire team to this once-every-two-year event. And when you come to the end of the podcast, click over to Heat Treat TV to see a recently released FNA 2018 promotional video that will whet your appetite for the event.

Tom Morrison, CEO, Metal Treating Institute

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #9: Tom Morrison on Why Manufacturers Should Send Their Entire Heat Treat Team to FNA 2018 Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #8: Karen Stanton and HTA’s “Coming to America” Story

October 16, 2017 / AEROSPACE HEAT TREAT, AEROSPACE HEAT TREAT NEWS, FEATURED NEWS, HEAT TREAT RADIO

What would the Australian Ministry of Defense have to do with heat treating in Southern California?

Karen Stanton, Director–Corporate & Strategy of Heat Treatment Australia (HTA), explains how a growing Australian aerospace and defense market propelled HTA’s launch of their first non-Australian heat treating shop, which is today located in Sante Fe Springs, California, within a reasonable distance of customers and suppliers alike.

Listen to Heat Treat Radio’s podcast (Episode #8) with Karen’s description of how expansion into the southern California heat treat market seemed to be the most reasonable move for an agile and growing company like HTA.

Click the play button below to listen.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #8: Karen Stanton and HTA’s “Coming to America” Story Read More »

Heat Treat Radio #7: Former Bodycote CEO Re-Enters Heat Treat Market

March 29, 2017 / FEATURED NEWS, HEAT TREAT RADIO, MANUFACTURING HEAT TREAT NEWS

Audio: Former Bodycote CEO Re-Enters Heat Treat Market

In this conversation, Heat Treat Radio host, Doug Glenn, interviews John Hubbard, longtime CEO of Bodycote who retired in 2009 and has recently re-entered the market with an aggressive capital investment company located in Baltimore, Maryland. This 20-minute Heat Treat Radio interview gives you all the important news about what Mr. Hubbard and the Calvert Street Capital Partners (CSCP) are planning. To date, CSCP, under the leadership of Mr. Hubbard, have snagged top talent from the industry, including Mike Sobieski and Don Longenette, and are actively pursuing the acquisition of well-established and profitable commercial heat treat across North America.

Our aerospace, automotive, medical, and energy manufacturers with in-house heat treats will find it encouraging to hear what John has to offer.

Click the play button below to listen.

To find other Heat Treat Radio episodes, go to www.heattreattoday.com/radio and look in the list of Heat Treat Radio episodes listed.

Heat Treat Radio #7: Former Bodycote CEO Re-Enters Heat Treat Market Read More »

heat treat radio

Audio: Jim Oakes

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Transcript: Jim Oakes

The Evolution of Data Collection

Sensor Technology

Preventative Maintenance

Operational Benefits of Data Collection

The SSI Data Capture

The Cloud and Security

Audio: C3 Data

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Transcript: C3 Data

C3 Data in Action

Audio: Heat Treat Radio: ITC Coatings

Transcript: Heat Treat Radio: ITC Coatings

What is it? Water-Based Ceramic Coatings

The Savings

Application — DIY or Letting the Pros Handle It?

Prep, Downtime, Restart

The Fine Print

Audio: Heat Treat Radio: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard

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Transcript: Heat Treat Radio: Laser Heat Treating with Laser Hard

Introducing Doug Peters of Peters’ Heat Treating and Blair Learn of Phoenix Laser Solutions

Introducing Chris Learn and Andy Wilkosz of LaserHard, Inc.

Portability

Here’s what’s important to remember:

Audio: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters

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Transcript: John Vanas on SX Oil Lifters

The Plant Floor: Where the Magic Happens

From Skepticism to New Product Line

Nano-Invasive Technology

Seeing the Wonder Wash in Action

Pouring Savings into the Tank Instead of Down the Drain

To receive a copy of Euclid’s Safety Data Worksheet for SX Oil Lifter, contact Doug Glenn at doug@heattreattoday.com.

Audio: Former Bodycote CEO Re-Enters Heat Treat Market

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