The Heat Treat Mexico 2020 ASM event in Queretaro, Mexico is now concluded and filed away in the history books. Most would deem the event as a success and we have these final photos for you.
Carburizing experts ALD always have a strong presence at all the worldwide heat treat events. In this photo we see Moises García, Natalie Beck and David Bolton
Nel Hydrogen; Tom Skoczylas, Carlos Ruiz
Gord Montgomery, Carlos Torres, Mattsa
Borbet Aluminum in Auburn, Alabama is expanding. German aluminum wheel manufacturer Borbet in Alabama is expanding and our understanding is that they will be adding to their current heat treating capacity; “Manufacturer Borbet Alabama announced plans Tuesday to expand its Auburn operation with a $23.9 million project that will create 25 jobs over the next two years. The Germany-based company was founded in 1881 as a family-run business and has become a leading European manufacturer of light metal alloy wheels for the automotive industry. Borbet has over $1 billion in annual sales with nine global operations. The company is recognized globally as a specialist in design excellence and high-quality production.”
In Canada rumour has it that Mr. Shawn Scott will be setting up his own commercial heat treat operation. Shawn is a long time experienced heat treater who was with Bodycote in Newmarket, Ontario for many years before moving to Bluewater Thermal in Kitchener where he was General Manager. The Bluewater facility closed a few months back with the equipment going to auction. We understand that Shawn bought some of the equipment and will be setting up his own commercial heat treat operation. In the UK we see that Mike Oldham of Vacuum & Atmosphere Services Ltd. has been promoted to head of Projects/Vacuum Technical Manager. Vacuum & Atmospheres Services is one of the largest providers of heat treat equipment in the UK and are also the regional agents for Ipsen. We at “The Monty” will be spending some time with the company later this year.
In the US furnace manufacturer Gasbarre Thermal Processing Systems have been named “Outstanding Supplier” by commercial heat treater Woodworth Inc., for supplying heat treating furnaces. Woodworth has plants in Michigan and Mexico and is one of the largest commercials in North America as rated by “The Monty” https://themonty.com/project/
Commercial heat treater Hauck, one of the largest commercials in Europe is adding capacity at their Värnamo, Sweden plant. This capacity takes the form of new Ipsen batch IQ equipment as can be seen in these photos.
McLaughlin Furnace Group of Avilla, Indiana, USA has just finished installation of this monster car bottom furnace. It has 27 million BTU of heating and can handle loads of 120,000 pounds at one time. Our understanding it that it is one of the largest furnaces in the US mid west.
And to round things out we have this photo of a very large in house heat treater in Mexico which we visited a few days past. Later this week we will have an in depth story about the heat treatment department (which includes pusher and batch IQ furnaces) and lots of photos. If any of our readers would like to guess who the company is we will give you a free mention.
The ASM “Heat Treat Mexico 2020” exhibition is now concluded and as we previously reported our feeling is that while this was a relatively small show it was deemed to be a success and it was certainly well organized. Earlier this week we posted photos from the event, we have these additional pictures to share with you with several more to come next week along with profiles of several large “in house” and commercial heat treaters.
Marathon Control Systems; No heat treat show in the world would be complete without a very strong showing by controls company MSC (Marathon Systems Control)-part of the UPC (United Process Controls Group)
Jack Kalucki, Nitrex. Nitrex is known around the world for their nitriding expertise and are always well represented at every heat treat function around. In this photo Jack Kalucki of Nitrex one of the foremost experts in the world when it comes to nitriding and certainly always one of the best dressed
Jack Kalucki, Nitrex, Pete Reh, Solar Manufacturing, Rick Jones, Solar Manufacturing
HEMO; Cleaning system specialists “HEMO” of Germany was in attendance and this included the Managing Director, Mr. Andreas Fritz along with Gord Montgomery
Earlier this week we had a summary about the massive in house heat treating department at auto parts supplier Dana Corporation in Queretaro, Mexico https://themonty.com/dana-corporation-queretaro-mexico/ To compliment the original story we have these additional photos showing parts of their heat treating facilities and some of the individuals responsible for keeping it running. This by the way is just the first of a few articles about in house heat treating at some of the largest manufacturers in Mexico and around the world.
Dana Forja; Gord Montgomery, Salvador Alvarado (SSi Mexico), Javier Nava (Dana Forja), Alex Garcia (Dana Inc.), Adab Marquez (SSi Mexico)
Dana Cardanes, Metallurgical Lab; Fernanda Olvera, Manuel Valencia
Dana Cardanes Batch IQ Department; Fernanda Olvera, Carlos Rodriguez
“Solar Manufacturing recently shipped a Mentor® vacuum furnace to Virginia, for a customer servicing the Tool and Die industry. The Model HFL-2018–2IQ features a graphite-insulated hot zone, a load weight capacity up to 250 lbs., and a maximum operating temperature of 2400° F. The HFL-2018–2IQ furnace will be used for solution annealing, ageing, and brazing. Measuring 12” wide x 12” high x 18” deep, the Mentor® includes the SolarVac® Essentials Control System.
“This company is a long-time customer of our sister company, Solar Atmospheres,” states Dan Insogna, Southeast Regional Sales Manager for Solar Manufacturing. “They wanted to own a Solar furnace themselves, for smaller, in-house jobs. Cal Amenheuser, Vice President of Operations with Solar Atmospheres played a big role in connecting Solar Manufacturing with the customer. The existing relationship with Cal, and Solar Manufacturing’s reputation in the industry earned us this order. We’re all excited they chose Solar Manufacturing for their first furnace.”
Solar Manufacturing designs and manufactures a wide variety of vacuum heat treating, sintering, and brazing furnaces and offers replacement hot zones, spare parts, and professional service. To learn more about Solar Manufacturing contact Pete Reh, VP of Sales, at 267-384-5040 x1509, or via email [email protected] or visit us at www.solarmfg.com.”
We are now at the ongoing 2 day Heat Treat Mexico 2020 event in Queretaro, Mexico. Organized by ASM this is the third time this bi-annual event has been held. While this is not a large event along the lines of an HK20 in Germany it is a well organized event and fills a niche, that of bringing together the heat treating industry in Mexico. We have these photos taken at the show just a few hours ago, and these will be complimented by a few more tomorrow. To round out this important event in the Mexican heat treat industry we will be profiling several more in house heat treaters in the area.
Gasbarre Thermal Processing Systems; Bill Gasbarre, Mark Saline, Ben Gasbarre, Humberto Bastidas
SECO Vacuum; Rafal Walczak, Carlos Carrasco
Codere; David Howard, Jose Ramirez Salvador
Ion Heat; Steven Sossa
As a Canadian (albeit in Mexico as we speak) the Corona Virus to date has been little more than scary headlines in newspapers with absolutely no effect on the Canadian, US or Mexican heat treat industry. However that is not the case in other parts of the world including Europe where it is having an effect on the industry. For instance all trade exhibitions in most parts of Europe have been postponed for March and April at which point further decisions will have to be made. While no major heat treatment exhibitions are planned for this period, there are a number of shows which do indeed have a heat treating aspect to them. In addition most of the major industry suppliers such as furnace suppliers have cancelled all travel except that deemed to be “unavoidable”. The turmoil and delays which this must be inflicting on the industry in terms of lost production, lengthened start up times and delay equipment decisions boggles our mind. At some point we might look back and see that this was all due to an overhyped media-time will tell.
There can be no better example of the frantic growth in the Mexican heat treating industry than that of furnace controls company SSi. Based in Cincinatti, Ohio, USA the company set up shop in Queretaro, Mexico a number of years back and since that time their sales and support team has grown to 14 people country wide while moving into a brand new building in 2018. Support and spare parts are based in Queretaro and sales is split into 5 different regions with sales people positioned in the largest heat treating areas in Mexico. This photo shows most of the SSi, Mexico team in their Queretaro offices.
When commercial heat treater Crio set up shop in Queretaro, Mexico in 2004 it was like most start ups a relatively modest operation. Over the years we have had the opportunity to see the company grow and in 2020 we see quite an impressive company with 2 locations in operation with a third on the way. The main facility is located in Queretaro which has now expanded three times with the result that it now has 58 employees and boasts several 36” X 48” X 36” batch IQ’s, a mesh belt line along with two very large carbottom furnaces.
The Saltillo plant also has large batch IQ furnaces along with 2 rotary hearth furnaces aligned with press quench systems and a total of 43 employees. The third location is in San Luis Potosi and currently the building is completed with the furnaces arriving later on this year. Combined Crio currently has 11 large batch IQ furnaces, 2 carbottoms, 2 rotary hearth furnaces and two press quench systems. While the company does do a reasonable amount of aerospace work the backbone of the company is automotive work which means that the company achieved CQI-9 certification a number of years back.
Caption; Gord Montgomery, Esteban Aguilar Garcia, Enrique Mujica
The “Crio” Team
The “Crio” Control Room
Auto parts giant Dana Corporation needs no introduction as one of the largest in house heat treaters in North America. Many years ago the company expanded into Mexico and in 2020 this includes an enormous complex in the Mexican city of Queretaro with several large, seperate in house heat treating departments. We at “The Monty” had the chance to visit it yesterday and it is certainly impressive. There is actually 3 separate facilities here, Dana Forja which has a heat treating department doing annealing in continuous furnaces, Dana Cardanes which has 7 batch IQ furnaces, roughly 40 induction lines and 11 tempers and Dana, ENCO which has 2 AFC-Holcroft UBQ furnaces along with 4 pusher furnaces. The fourth facility, CV Components has no heat treat to speak of which is where our interest ended. We were fortunate enough to be able to take a number of photos, two of which are below with more to come later this week as we continue to talk about in house and commercial heat treating in Mexico.
