Out in the western USA, Steve Driscoll has created a very nice commercial heat treating operation by the name of Thermal-Vac Technology. Over the years we have mentioned the company several times; a couple of recent mentions include when they announced a very large investment in the facility in June of 2018 and also back in 2014 when they acquired City Steel Treating. Be that as it may the company is giving us this update;   “I have attached some breaking news from Thermal-Vac Technology! To summarize:  

David Pye is known around the world as one of the heat treat industry’s most knowledgeable consultants. Today he offers his thoughts on high pressure gas quenching in vacuum furnaces.

“Work has been conducted on this quench technology for many years now. In fact as far back as the early 1960’s with Reynoldson and Dawes in UK when they presented their work on using 2 bar over pressure with nitrogen and helium as the quench medium gases. Work progressed on the development of blended gas mixtures to substitute the liquid quench insulating vapor phase with a thermally efficient and effective cooling gas. The two most thermally effective cooling gases are:

The writer has seen the use of 6 bar over pressure using 20% Hydrogen and 80% Nitrogen in vacuum work very effectively on tool steel heat treatments such as the D series, the High Speed Steels, and H series for example. Generally the pressure used today is a maximum of 20 bar over pressure (maximum) using blended mixtures of helium and nitrogen. The blend ratio can be blended according to the steel that is being treated. Thus one can now create the quench medium that best suites the type of steel being treated.  The reason for the blend of nitrogen as the dilutant gas is one derived purely because of process economics.There are three perquisites for high pressure gas quenching which are:

Because of the expense of helium, the focus of gas quenching (under partial pressure conditions)  has been with nitrogen. The pressures being used today are generally in the region of 10 bar to 20 bar  (Max) over pressure. The nitrogen is simply blown off to atmosphere and not usually recycled. The important factor about high pressure gas quenching, is that the completed work does not require any post cleaning whatsoever. The parts are almost as bright as when they went into the process vacuum furnace. A word of caution is necessary at this juncture. Do not exceed the rated over pressure quench capabilities of the vacuum furnace. This can result in serious damage to the furnace with the potential for serious injury. Sincerely David [email protected]” 

Commercial heat treater East Carolina with two locations in the US, Raleigh, NC and Virginia Metal Treating in Lynchburg, Virginia recently ordered another batch IQ furnace. The furnace to be provided by Surface Combustion is a 36″ X 48″ X 36″ size unit capable of 4,000 pound loads. This system will fit in line with another Surface unit the company already has in place.

We ran across two recent “people changes” which we would consider worth mentioning. It looks like Joshua Farrell very recently became Plant Manager of commercial heat treater Mid South Metallurgical in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, USA. Previous to this Joshua had spent 26 years as Production Manager at Century Sun Heat Treat in Michigan. Mid South is a long established commercial heat treater owned and run by Mr. Clif Coleman which has batch IQ furnaces, Vacuum furnaces and Ion Nitriding systems. In this photo we see Clif and his Quality Manager Jay Hendershot.

It would appear that Mike Nappi left Feintool in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA mid December of this year. Mike worked at Cincinnati Steel Treating for many years before joining Feintool. Feintool is an interesting company which offers fineblanking which required a great deal of heat treating-some of which is done in-house although most is outsourced to local commercial heat treaters. We’re not sure where Mike has ended up but we assume it will be in another heat treating capacity.

Going back a number of years there was a very colorful individual by the name of Tom Guler in Australia who had made a real name for himself designing and building new furnaces over the course of a 60 year career in the industry (Tom passed away back in 2012 at the ripe old age of 90). Like many in the industry his son, Byron Stewart followed in his footsteps and ended up starting up a new furnace building company in Beijing quite a few years back by the name of Beijing Huahai Zhongyi Industrial Furnaces Co Ltd ,  (or HHZY). We have mentioned Byron and his company a couple of times over the years and today we have this update for you. “I hope all is well, here in China it is getting to be a real madhouse in the heat treating industry as the furnaces keep getting larger, the orders keep coming and China requires more and more heat treating processes.  To give you an example we did over 150 furnaces last year including the Guler design and a new vacuum carburizing oil quench furnace line. This year I have to put in a new pressure vacuum temper furnace plus a complete vertical vacuum heat treatment line including 2 vacuum hardening furnaces  and 4 vacuum tempers-all completely automated. My prediction is that 2019 is going to be a very big year in China. Best regards, Byron”

A captive/commercial heat treater in the Western US is closing down putting several used furnaces on the market (more details on this later). One of the furnaces is a 3 year old Ipsen Titan H2 vacuum furnace with working dimensions of 18″ wide X 24″ deep X 18″ high, 2 bar nitrogen quenching, a maximum temperature of 2400F and diffusion pump-all in all a very desirable furnace. We have always said that the most a used furnace will fetch on the open market is half of the new price and this unit was a perfect example. It was listed at $185,000 USD and took a grand total of 2 days to sell at almost full asking price, an asking price which as you have guessed was a little over half of the price of new. This photo does not do the furnace justice as it was in good condition.

Family owned commercial heat treater Cambridge Heat Treat in Canada had a very good year in 2018 which is what most heat treaters also found. Very much to their credit the company made a number of very substantial investments in everything from new furnaces to new controls to office and building improvements-these photos give you an idea. In the one photo you see Don and Peter Robbins who along with their sister Cheryl Mortimer (not shown) own and run the company.

Aero Engine Corp of China is a state owned aerospace entity formed in 2016 from several previously separate companies. Within the past week French furnace builder BMI shipped two new vacuum furnaces to the company’s locations in China. Both are designed for stress relieving and annealing of titanium alloy steels. Early in the new year BMI will be shipping 3 more vacuum furnaces to AECC companies in China and this will bring the total number of furnaces BMI has installed in mainland China to 63.

Earlier this week be mentioned the very sad news about Dan O’Dell a long time heat treater passing away at a relatively young age. A reader sent us this photo (date unknown) from a Hinderliter Heat Treating Awards party. Danny is on the right in the Tux, Betty and Wally Bamford of Can Eng Furnaces are pictured as is John Hubbard-we are not sure about the individual holing the picture.