​Auto parts giant Dana Corporation needs no introduction as one of the globe’s largest suppliers of auto and truck parts (and of more interest to us at “The Monty Heat Treat News” one of the largest in house heat treaters in the world). As an example of how much heat treating the company does we can say that Dana has 88 manufacturing facilities around the world of which 41 have heat treating in house which represents 13 different types of heat treatment.

Our interest today lies in the Dana, Queretaro, Mexico, Drive Shaft facility which is ranked by “The Monty Heat Treat News” as one of the 11 largest captive heat treats in North America. Many years ago the company expanded into Mexico with a number of different locations and this includes an enormous complex in the Mexican city of Queretaro. We at “The Monty” have had the chance to visit this location several times over the years and it is certainly impressive. There are actually 3 separate facilities here which have heat treating, Dana Forja, which has a heat treating department doing annealing and normalizing in continuous furnaces, Dana Cardenes which has 7 batch IQ furnaces and a great deal of induction (more on that later) and Dana, ENCO which has batch IQ and pusher furnaces.

Our most recent visit took place yesterday and focused on the Cardenes facility in general and their induction heat treating department in particular. Our host was Mr. Alejandro Garcia, “Heat Treatment Champion Engineer” which means he oversees induction heat treating for all Dana facilities. He is a 7 year veteran of the company and we couldn’t have asked for a more knowledgeable and friendly tour guide. During our discussion with him and his team we learned that in total this facility has a total of 41 Induction systems, most of fairly recent vintage and “state of the art”.

Alejandro Garcia, DANA, Salvador Alvarado, SSi Mexico

Overall induction hardening accounts for over half Dana’s total heat treat requirements with atmosphere heat treating being slightly in the minority-induction of course being largely for shafts, atmosphere heat treatment for gears. We should point out at this time that induction like all technologies has benefits and drawbacks but a large advantage in many people’s eyes is the fact that it produces little in the way of CO2 emissions. This very interesting photo shows the finished end product, both a front and rear wheel axle assembly. In the background we see from the left; Salvador Alvarado, SSI Mexico, Alejandro Garcia, Dana, Carlos Rodriguez, Metallurgical Coordinator and Adab Marquez, SSi Mexico.

Earlier we mentioned the Dana Forja facility-this includes several continuous furnaces for annealing and normalizing product after forging and heat treating. Part of this department can be seen in this picture which shows from left to right; Jordan Montgomery, The Monty, Alejandro, Garcia, Celeste Olvera, DANA and Gord Montgomery, The Monty.

Over the years “The Monty Heat Treat News” has visited this location several times-dating back at least 6 years now from our first visit and the difference was striking. What we witnessed on this visit was a location dedicated to safety, well organized part flow, cleanliness and quality with a very strong dash of “light & bright” thrown in. This picture shows part of the team responsible;

Alejandro Garcia, Serafin Miranda, Dana Manager, Celeste Olvera, Dana Forge Project Eng., Noe Hernández, Dana Forge Operations Manager

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