In this week’s action packed episode of “The Heat Treat Podcast” our articulate and charming host, Mr. Carlos Torres talks about New Technologies on LPC with James Muenzenberger and Kelly Peters of ALD Thermal Treatment in Port Huron, Michigan, USA.  

“ALD Heat Treat Services is considered to be one of the premier heat treat organizations in the world specializing in distortion control through its specialization in Low Pressure Carburizing (LPC) and High Pressure Gas Quenching (HPGQ). ALD Vacuum Technologies GmbH., operates two facilities in North America; each ideally located in the manufacturing heartland of the United States and Mexico. ALD Thermal Treatment, Inc., located in Port Huron, MI, opened in 2006 and the sister plant in Ramos Arizpe, Coah. (Mexico), launched in 2008, have both earned the prestigious General Motors Supplier Quality Excellence Award for six consecutive years. ALD is proud to note that they are the only outside heat treat facilities in the GM supply base who can claim this honor. ALD also operates another state of the art facility in Saxony, Germany and are on track for a fourth facility in Suzhou China in early 2021.

We are the solution for superior quality vacuum heat treating services, with a strong international presence and worldwide operation which includes furnace sales and furnace equipment servicing offered by our world-renowned ALD affiliates. Our Quality System, automation controls, Research & Development Team, in-house Laboratory, and other internal processes are robust and second to none. We are IATF 16949, AS9100, and ISO 9001 Certified, and we are also ISO 27001 and ISO 14001 compliant. We are currently seeking NADCAP certification and look forward to servicing the Aerospace Community with the highest degree of quality and precision available in the market today. Our processes minimize the distortion of precision manufactured components, such as the gears and thin walled parts found in major automotive (trucks and off-road vehicles), energy and aerospace applications. Often, our customers can reduce or totally eliminate post heat treat processing resulting in total part cost optimization.” www.ald.com

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ALD Vacuum Technologies is hosting a wide range of online seminars. In this series, you will learn the ins and outs of ALD’s cutting edge technology in Low Pressure Carburizing (LPC), High Pressure Gas Quench (HPGQ), and Low Pressure Carbonitriding (LPCN). Don’t worry if you can’t make the first session on February 23rd! The series is ongoing and you can join the remaining sessions.

Here is the registration link for our upcoming webinar series.  Upon registration, you will receive a confirmation e-mail and access link from [email protected] to the LPC seminar series 2022.

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Franklin, Indiana, USA, February, 16, 2022 / Nitrex’s heat treating facility in Franklin, Indiana, has been granted its Nadcap reaccreditation. The Nitrex Heat Treating Services (HTS) facility in Franklin, Indiana, received the Nadcap (National Aerospace and Defense Contractors Accreditation Program) accreditation for the following processes: heat treating for multiple alloy families, stress relieving, carburizing, nitriding, vacuum heat treating, hardness and metallography.

“This central US location and the Nitrex expertise will be used to expand our aerospace focus and business in the US,” says Mark K. Hemsath, vice president of Sales at Nitrex Heat Treating Services, Americas. The Nadcap is known as the highest level of quality certification when it comes to heat treating. It is not only valuable in the aerospace sector, but it also shows a trusted level of expertise in the defense and precision industries.

“Nitrex is global leader in gas nitriding and this accreditation not only shows our commitment to offer the best quality to our customers, but also our expertise in alternative processes,” remarks Mr. Hemsath. Currently, Nadcap has approved the operations of the Nitrex HTS facilities in Franklin, Indiana, and in Queretaro, Mexico.

Why Nadcap?

As the highest level of international aerospace approval, a Nadcap accreditation (https://p-r-i.org/nadcap/) is considered to be the hardest one to obtain. This industry-managed program has the most stringent requirements to ensure that those using special processes and heat treating parts for the aerospace industry adhere to consistent, high-quality standards. Focusing on maintaining global quality standards not only helps ensure the safety of everyone using these products, but it also helps companies continually improve and refine heat treatment processes to provide customers with the best product quality possible.

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The largest furnace builder in Turkey, Sistem Teknik of Istanbul has just announced that their new facility in Bulgaria is now in operation as you can see in the press release below. We had the chance to visit Sistem Teknik a few years ago and what you see in this photo is fairly typical of what the company produces, in this case an automated furnace line with press quenching.

“We are excited to announce that our new factory in Bulgaria is now under operation with a team of 16 experienced engineers and technicians. We produce melting and heat treatment furnaces at Sistem Teknik, Bulgaria and we are aiming to complete 1 furnace/month. By expanding our production line through borders, we aspire to continue delivering our technology to all parts of the world at full speed and strength.”

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Solar Atmospheres of Western PA received delivery of their Vacuum Oil Quench (VOQ) furnace from Solar Manufacturing last week. This 36” x 36″ x 48” furnace will be fully installed, tested and operational in early April. See the largest component, a 40,000 pound vestibule / oil quench tank, being transferred and inverted into its pit. This will be the first vacuum oil quench furnace to employ work thermocouples in the actual load! More to come on this unique furnace . . .

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SECO/WARWICK will deliver a compact Vector® vacuum furnace with a 400x400x600mm heating chamber to Michelin. It will be indispensable for the gas hardening process used in the manufacture of tools for premium tires.

“With a relatively low expenditure, the compact Vector vacuum furnace makes it possible to become independent from third parties. It also provides better control over the quality of heat-treated components and reduces the risk of delays which, as a result of lack of deliveries, slow down or obstruct manufacturing processes (tire manufacturing in this case). This is a very reasonable approach with a proven furnace design utilizing a round heating chamber, ergonomic pumping system and a powerful cooling system based on a blower that ensures the maximum hardening pressure up to 15 bar abs” said Maciej Korecki, Vice-President, Vacuum Furnace Segment, SECO/WARWICK Group.

The Vector vacuum furnace enables highly efficient hardening processes thanks to the use of high pressure and cooling gas. Vector® vacuum furnaces can be used for the majority of standard hardening, tempering, annealing, solution heat treating and brazing processes. However, a device can always be adapted to the specific requirements of the customer and thus to the particular industry. The device is available in several sizes, so its output perfectly fits the customer’s needs. The Vector range is characterized by low consumption of energy and heating chamber performance as well as clean and quick processing. This flagship SECO/WARWICK product is already in operation in more than 70 countries worldwide, working for industries such as aviation, automotive or defense.

Michelin is the largest in Europe, and one of the largest global tire manufacturers. Its headquarters is located in Clermont-Ferrand (Puy-de-Dôme), France. The company manufactures tires mostly intended for passenger vehicles, trucks, agricultural machinery, and motorcycles as well as bicycle tubes and tires, and aircraft and space shuttle tires. Michelin has 56 production plants in 17 countries as well as 3 technology centers in France, Japan, and the United States. The Polish Michelin plant employs 4126 people and is the largest Michelin plant around the world in terms of the number of employees, and ranks third in terms of production capacity.

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“A metallurgist in Washington state was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison and a $50,000 fine Monday after she spent decades faking the results of strength tests on steel that was being used to make U.S. Navy submarines. Elaine Marie Thomas, 67, of Auburn, Washington, was the director of metallurgy at a foundry in Tacoma that supplied steel castings used by Navy contractors Electric Boat and Newport News Shipbuilding to make submarine hulls.

From 1985 through 2017, Thomas falsified the results of strength and toughness tests for about half the steel the foundry produced for the Navy. The tests were intended to show that the steel would not fail in a collision or in certain “wartime scenarios,” the Justice Department said. Thomas pleaded guilty to fraud last November. U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle sentenced her in Tacoma, calling her actions a “crime of pride and ego, that in some way she knew better than those who set the standards,” according to a news release from Seattle U.S. Attorney Nick Brown. The sentence was less than half the nearly six years sought by prosecutors.

“Our Sailors and Marines depend upon high quality products and services from our contractors to safely and effectively meet the worldwide mission of the Department of the Navy,” Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro said. “We will continue to insist that our contractors must meet these high standards.” There was no allegation that any submarine hulls failed. But authorities said the Navy has spent nearly $14 million, including 50,000 hours of engineering work, to assess the parts and risk to the 30 submarines affected. The Navy says it will incur further costs as it continues monitoring the subs. Thomas’ conduct came to light in 2017, when a metallurgist being groomed to replace her noticed suspicious test results and alerted their company, Kansas City-based Bradken Inc., which acquired the foundry in 2008. Bradken fired Thomas and initially disclosed its findings to the Navy, but the company then wrongfully suggested that the discrepancies were not the result of fraud. That hindered the Navy’s investigation into the scope of the problem as well as its efforts to remediate the risks to its sailors, prosecutors said.

In June 2020, the company agreed to pay $10.9 million in a deferred-prosecution agreement. When confronted with the doctored results, Thomas told investigators, “Yeah, that looks bad,” the Justice Department said. She suggested that in some cases she changed the tests to passing grades because she thought it was “stupid” that the Navy required the tests to be conducted at negative-100 degrees Fahrenheit (negative-73.3 degrees Celsius). In a letter to the court, Thomas said she was mortified at what she had done. Her attorney, John Carpenter, noted in a sentencing memorandum that she did not gain financially by faking the test results. He asked for a sentence of probation. “Ms. Thomas is good person who let a number of work pressures cause her to make bad decisions,” he wrote. “Ms. Thomas never intended to place any sailor at risk and is gratified that the Navy’s testing compels the conclusion that she has not.” From “Defense News”

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To date we have been proud to present almost 50 episodes of “The Heat Treat Podcast”, all of which can be found at  Magazine & Podcasts | The Monty Our moderator Mr. Carlos Torres does a tremendous job of speaking with the leading figures in the global heat treatment industry and this includes captive heat treaters, industry suppliers, consultants and commercial heat treaters. Our next podcast, coming this week features one of the largest commercial, vacuum carburizing firms in the world, ALD Thermal Treatment. (By the way If you would like to be featured in “The Heat Treat Podcast” please let us know, [email protected] as we are always looking for interesting guests). In the meantime we leave you with this information about ALD who incidentally is ranked by “The Monty Heat Treat News” as one of the largest commercial heat treaters in North America; 50 Largest North American Commercial Heat Treats 2021 | The Monty

ALD Heat Treat Services is considered to be one of the premier heat treat organizations in the world specializing in distortion control through its specialization in Low Pressure Carburizing (LPC) and High Pressure Gas Quenching (HPGQ). ALD Vacuum Technologies GmbH., operates two facilities in North America; each ideally located in the manufacturing heartland of the United States and Mexico. ALD Thermal Treatment, Inc., located in Port Huron, MI, opened in 2006 and the sister plant in Ramos Arizpe, Coah. (Mexico), launched in 2008, have both earned the prestigious General Motors Supplier Quality Excellence Award for six consecutive years. ALD is proud to note that they are the only outside heat treat facilities in the GM supply base who can claim this honor. ALD also operates another state of the art facility in Saxony, Germany and are on track for a fourth facility in Suzhou China in early 2021.

We are the solution for superior quality vacuum heat treating services, with a strong international presence and worldwide operation which includes furnace sales and furnace equipment servicing offered by our world-renowned ALD affiliates. Our Quality System, automation controls, Research & Development Team, in-house Laboratory, and other internal processes are robust and second to none. We are IATF 16949, AS9100, and ISO 9001 Certified, and we are also ISO 27001 and ISO 14001 compliant. We are currently seeking NADCAP certification and look forward to servicing the Aerospace Community with the highest degree of quality and precision available in the market today. Our processes minimize the distortion of precision manufactured components, such as the gears and thin walled parts found in major automotive (trucks and off-road vehicles), energy and aerospace applications. Often, our customers can reduce or totally eliminate post heat treat processing resulting in total part cost optimization.

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Effective immediately, C3 Data’s real-time pyrometry compliance status can directly inform Bluestreak™, a leading Heat Treat Manufacturing Execution System (MES) and Quality Management System (QMS) whether parts about to be loaded into a specific furnace meet AMS2750 compliance.

This collaboration enables two informational platforms to work in unison, effectively eliminating human-error-prone (manual) processes associated with pyrometry compliance. Since Bluestreak™ is already being used by many heat treaters for quoting and sales, work order entry and management, scheduling of jobs, production control and real-time job-step tracking, quality management, compliance assurance and documentation control, now operators will have the C3 pyrometry compliance connected to Bluestreak™ in real-time.

Both Bluestreak™ and C3 Data have built their solutions designed specifically for the Heat Treat industry. Every Heat Treat job has its own unique requirements, customer/part specifications, compliance requirements, preferred list of vendors, operational constraints and audit management procedures to control, track and document each individual job and work order.

“Our partnership with C3 Data is a logical one because we both excel in data integration and specification management. Bluestreak’s™ Integrated Quality Management System (QMS) ties quality control and quality assurance directly to production Work Centers, individual operator accountability and equipment maintenance and management, including furnaces. Both companies help clients pass audits with ease and clarity, every time,” states Todd Wenzel, President of Bluestreak™.”

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We have news of 3 upcoming auctions which will feature at least some surplus heat treat equipment. From what we know of the equipment we don’t expect to see a great deal of interest but we at “The Monty Heat Treat News” are firm believers that there is a buyer out there for virtually everything (except possibly fluidized bed furnaces).

The first auction worth mentioning is Apex Tool Group in Sumter, SC which will be held February 25th. The main feature of this offering will be a big, old Ajax austempering line-50/50 scrapping versus being sold as a going concern would be our guess. The second auction we are mentioning today is at CJT Koolcarb in Carol Stream, Illinois, USA. Featured in this event are a couple of ovens and two out of service, old CI Hayes units-scrap value only for everything would be our suggestion. The final auction we mention today is at Hub City Gearing out in South Dakota and is the most interesting of the bunch. In the auction we find some Induction equipment which will sell, and a few older Lindberg batch IQ’s and associated equipment. Because of the age and size (small) we predict that the batch IQ’s will sell but not for a great deal.

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