Today we start off with a news item from ALD Thermal Treatment in Port Huron, Michigan, USA one of the largest commercial heat treaters in North America as ranked by “The Monty” https://themonty.com/project/largest-north-american-commercial-heat-treats-august-2020/. “ALD Heat Treat Services, 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) announced this week that Kelly Peters has been appointed Vice President of Operations for the Port Huron Michigan plant. Kelly brings an exciting history and heat treat pedigree to this role.  Not only has she worked her way to Vice President Operations from her first position as a production associate 12 years ago, but her father Robert Peters, was the Vice President of Operations who opened the facility in 2005. “I’m excited about taking on this role, although the timing of the promotion in the midst of a global pandemic certainly poses unique challenges” according Ms. Peters.  She goes on to say that she inherits an excellent team In Port Huron, focused on success and growth in new and exciting markets.”  In more people news we see that Mr. Lewis Lance, a very well known individual in the North American heat treating industry is looking for a change. Up until recently Lewis was General Manager of Diamond Heat Treat in Rockford, Illinois but things change. Diamond Heat Treat is part Thermal Process Holdings another company on our list of the 30 largest commercial heat treats in North America.

Bodycote, the worlds largest commercial heat treater recently released a trading update for the first 4 months of the year and it comes as no surprise that the company has been effected by the COVID 19. Profits are down and layoffs and plant closures have been announced (most of this information can be found on our website). In spite of that share prices are coming roaring back with this summary from  a Wall Street financial firm; “Bodycote shareholders are no doubt pleased to see that the share price has had a great month, posting a 30% gain, recovering from prior weakness. The bad news is that even after that recovery shareholders are still underwater by about 9.1% for the full year. All else being equal, a sharp share price increase should make a stock less attractive to potential investors. While the market sentiment towards a stock is very changeable, in the long run, the share price will tend to move in the same direction as earnings per share. The implication here is that deep value investors might steer clear when expectations of a company are too high.”

Commercial heat treat Cascade Metallurgical out in Kent, Washington, USA is up for sale. Last year the company was looking at selling their land and building and the business however it didn’t happen. However after that first false start our understanding is that the company again is looking for a new buyer. The new facility at Virginia Metal Treating is slowly moving ahead as we can see in this picture. Virginia Metal is part of East Carolina Metal Treating Inc., another company which recently made our list of the largest commercials in North America.

From Paulo, the second largest commercial heat treater in North America we have this press release; Paulo is excited to announce that two divisions have been awarded Bell Textron approval. On-site audits (Pre-COVID19) of both the Cleveland and Kansas Divisions took place resulting in approval to process parts deemed “Primary”, “Critical”, “Flight Safety”, or “Fatigue Controlled” by Bell Textron. Both Paulo locations are eager to begin processing work for Bell and their suppliers.  The two facilities hold Nadcap Merit Status and provide many types of Heat Treatment as well as Brazing and Hot Isostatic Pressing.” Euro Powdered Metal 2020 to be a virtual event. This comes as no surprise that the Euro PM event for 2020 will be a virtual event as HK20 the largest German heat treat exhibition which was to be held in Cologne, Germany in October is also going the same route. We at “The Monty” are still very curious about what a virtual event looks like-how do you have a few beers with your heat treat buddies when it is virtual? “The next physical edition of the Euro PM Congress & Exhibition will be held in Lisbon in 2021, while a virtual event will be held this year to enable the presentation of all papers originally on the programme for Euro PM2020. Following the recent announcement by the European Powder Metallurgy Association (EPMA) that the next Euro PM Congress & Exhibition has been postponed until October 17–20, 2021, it has confirmed that a Virtual Congress will be held in place of the 2020 event. In an official statement sent via email, the organisers wrote, “In recent weeks, we have all been following the uncertainty and spread of the COVID-19 virus worldwide. The pandemic impacts all business in different ways; and given the difficulties participants may have travelling to Lisbon, as well as the high safety and financial constraints of running a live meeting in 2020, the EPMA Board has decided to postpone the live Euro PM Congress & Exhibition event in Lisbon until 17-20 October 2021.” This new event will be held online as a webinar from October 5–7, 2020. The Virtual Congress is expected to allow all 300+ technical papers to be presented during a live webinar. 

To round things out for today we have this press release from L&L Special Furnace about an order the company recently received; “L&L Special Furnace Co., Inc. has delivered  three multipurpose GS2026 bench mounted box furnaces used to test high-temperature aerospace fasteners. The fastener manufacturer located in Pennsylvania now has a total of five GS series furnaces at its facility. The new model GS2026 has internal dimensions of 18” wide by 12” high by 24” deep. It has an operating voltage of 208, 220, 240 volts single phase, 60 or 50 hertz.”