Aluminum sheets and heat treating services are among the categories of upwardly trending activity that Tony Uphoff recently reported on at Thomasnet.com. In addition to how well each area is doing above historical averages, the analysis includes this tidbit: “according to U.S. census data, 96 percent of heat treatment companies employ fewer than 100 workers; 68 percent employ fewer than 20.”
David Llewellyn, Mizuno’s director of research and development for golf
In the quest for more opportunities for off-center hit performance, the research and development team at Japanese sports equipment and sportswear company utilized advanced forging and heat treating techniques in the design of the recently debuted Mizuno GT180 lineup of woods, “with an obvious emphasis on precision adjustability . . . [and] a fresh commitment to speed.”
Club designers have been using high-strength titanium alloy SP-700 for a while, but precision processing increases design possibilities, says David Llewellyn, Mizuno’s director of research and development for golf. The new driver boasts multiple weights and three tracks to control flight and spin.
A supplier of plasma-based heat and surface treatment solutions to the metals industry has delivered a high-speed annealing line for precision stainless steel and nickel alloy tubes for a producer of small size precision tubing.
A Pennsylvania-based manufacturer of specialty materials and complex components predominantly for aerospace & defense industries recently signed two new long-term pricing agreements (LTPAs) with General Dynamics (GD) Land Systems, a supply chain network provider for the U.S. military and its allies, based in Richland, Washington, to be the preferred supplier of titanium plate for the Abrams tank (United States) and the AJAX specialist vehicle (United Kingdom).
Allegheny Technologies Incorporated (ATI) will begin production of titanium products at its melt facility in Richland and will complete it at ATI’s specialty plate facility in Washington, Pennsylvania.
“We are pleased to enter into these agreements with GD Land Systems, marking the beginning of a new relationship with this strategic global customer,” said Rich Harshman, ATI’s chairman, president, and CEO. “ATI is forging a strong technology connection with GD and together we are developing specialty materials and components for improved protection and light-weighting of next-generation military vehicles.”
“Revenue from these LTPAs will total approximately $75 million combined over the contract periods. This marks a significant increase in the Flat-Rolled Products segment’s strategic aerospace and defense market sales, which are an integral part of our ongoing portfolio transformation toward more high-value products,” said Bob Wetherbee, executive vice president, Flat-Rolled Products Group.
Bob Wetherbee, executive vice president, Flat Rolled Products Group
The Abrams LTPA runs through 2019 while the AJAX LTPA runs through 2021.
Ellwood City Forge (ECF), a steel and heavy metals manufacturing group in Ellwood City, Pennsylvania, with heat treating facilities in multiple locations, recently launched construction on the renovation and expansion of its office facilities at the same location on Second Street where the company broke ground and has been in operation since 1910.
The project will include renovation of ECF’s existing building and construction of a new, adjoining building and continue to house the offices of parent company Ellwood Group, adjacent to manufacturing operations, including bloom processing. Heat treating, forging, and machining operations are located at two of ECF’s other six plants — New Castle, Pennsylvania, and Corry, Pennsylvania.
Ellwood City Forge supplies open-die forgings for a broad range of applications, including oil & gas, power generation, mining, industrial machinery, metal processing, power transmission and gearing, aerospace, infrastructure and construction, defense, and shipbuilding.
Left to Right: Evan Fennell, Engineer and Project Manager, ECF; Ray Santillo, Executive Director, EC Chamber of Commerce; Steve Paxton, Architect, Franus Architectural Associates; Denny Boariu, Product Specialist, Ellwood City Forge/Chamber of Commerce Representative; Tony Court, Mayor, Ellwood City; Anna Barensfeld, Shareholder, Ellwood Group; Bill Nardone, VP of Operations, Ellwood City Forge; Dan Franus, Architect, Franus Architectural Associates; Phil DiMarco, Principal, DiMarco Construction
Applying the slow quench-polish-quench (QPQ) to a rifle barrel
Steve Adelmann at Shooting Illustrated gets the conversation going among gun aficionados about the pros and cons of using a surface treatment on rifle barrels called “liquid salt bath ferritic nitrocarburizing non-cyanide bath”, more commonly known as FNC. Experts weigh in on nitrided barrels and agree that accuracy in the heat treating process known as slow quench-polish-quench (QPQ) produces long-term results that substantially outweigh other types of barrel treatments.
William Whiteley & Sons, the oldest scissor-makers in the western world, has chosen a UK-based company that specializes in hard coatings, heat treatment, and vacuum brazing, among other services, to provide the Titanium Nitride PVD coating on their new EXO Gold scissor.
The EXO range has been developed with assistance from the Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) at the University of Sheffield, using state of the art 3D tooling, surgical grade stainless steel and advanced coating materials, including TiN from Wallwork Cambridge. The scissors can cut through the toughest materials encountered by tailors and haberdashers, crafters and DIYers, boaters and interior designers.
A heat treater with facilities in Pennsylvania and Alabama was recently given the green light by township officials in Lansdale, Pennsylvania, to expand operations at its plant outside Philadelphia, including the construction of a new vacuum bay and the acquisition of vacuum furnaces needed for a new product line.
Rex Heat Treat provides thermal processing in Lansdale and Bedford, Pennsylvania, and in Aniston, Alabama, for customers from a broad range of industries.
“This facility improvement will provide the proper climate-controlled environment to enable Rex Heat Treat to offer lower cost vacuum heat treating solutions to the Philadelphia heat treating market and be a platform for further vacuum processing expansions,” stated Johnathan Rex, General Manager.
Andrea Alborghetti, Technical Manager of TAV Vacuum Furnaces
Andrea Alborghetti, technical manager of TAV Vacuum Furnaces and contributor to the company’s blog, has provided a comprehensive, step-by-step overview of how to achieve “perfect vacuum sintering”, which includes an explanation of the metallurgic technologies involved; a review of debinding, “the first critical step of sintering”; and the factors to be taken into consideration when choosing what type of heat treatment process to use in order to obtain “a high quality of the end material in terms of density, porosity, and mechanical resistance.”
Barbara Smith, president and CEO of Commercial Metals Co.
Four electric arc furnace (EAF) steel mills in Knoxville, Tennessee; Jacksonville, Florida; Sayreville, New Jersey; and Rancho Cucamonga, California, as well as 33 rebar fabrication facilities are among the assets included in an acquisition agreement between steelmaker Commercial Metals Co. (CMC), located in Irving, Texas, and Brazil-based steelmaker Gerdau S.A..
CMC operates heat treating and related facilities in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Alabama, in addition to steel mills, fabrication facilities, and other operations throughout the world. The mills and facilities included in Gerdau’s divestment have annual rolling capacity of 2.5 million tons, increasing CMC’s global melt capacity to 7.2 million tons.
“This acquisition aligns with our strategy to focus on our strength in concrete reinforcing products and leverages CMC’s core competencies in rebar production and value-added fabrication services to nonresidential construction customers,” said Barbara Smith, president and CEO of CMC. “In addition, these assets provide us the opportunity to optimize our product mix more fully in the U.S. As a leader in rebar manufacturing technology and customer service, we are excited to take advantage of our expertise to increase throughput, lower costs and improve the customer experience in our new operations.”
The deal, which is expected to close before the end of 2018, would leave Gerdau with three fabrication shops in the U.S..
