Earlier this year “The Monty Heat Treat News” had an exclusive article about a multi-million dollar order for new furnaces, quite possibly the largest new furnace order in North America in 2021. As a follow up to that article we have received this press release from one of the suppliers, SECO/WARWICK explaining what their involvement in the project is-to which we would have to say congratulations on a very impressive order.

We can add that the customer is a Canadian based supplier of extrusion dies with locations around the world and that the total furnace order involved more than one supplier due to different technologies. We can also add that at least in the case of the Canadian division it has been operating fluidized bed furnaces for as long as we can remember-which goes back quite some time now.

A principal maker of tooling for the aluminum extrusion industry with operations in North and South America has pulled the trigger on a massive overhaul to its heat treating operations in three locations, replacing much of its legacy equipment with modern day technology. The customer has committed a multi-million dollar purchase to modernize heat treating operations in its Canada, USA and Mexico plants.

The order consists of four (4) Vector® single chamber gas quench vacuum furnaces, six (6) tempering furnaces, and one (1) ZeroFlow® pit-type gas nitriding furnace. The Mexico plant will benefit from brand new heat treating capacity, while the USA and Canada plants will be augmented with new vacuum heat treating technology, in one case replacing its legacy fluidized bed operations with 21^st century technology.  Each site will also receive various upgrades to their water cooling and gas distribution systems with a full turnkey system installation to wrap things up.

“This is a big deal for the customer. They’ll benefit from a complete modernization of their heat treatment capabilities across all of North America, with clean, efficient vacuum heat treatment technologies. It’s a bigger deal for vacuum heat treating as a whole. It proves we’ve made great strides in the industry to convert legacy atmosphere users into vacuum technology believers. And it’s the biggest deal that we at SECO/VACUUM have made with a single customer since we began our division in 2017. We are delighted to partner with this customer in a 21st century operational upgrade to their heat treatment capabilities across multiple plants. I am also very proud of our SECO/VISORY solutions team, who worked hand-in-hand with the customer to solve their process challenges collaboratively.” Said Peter Zawistowski, Managing Director of SECO/VACUUM.

The customer recognized that reliance on older gas-fired atmosphere combustion technology could not continue to move its mission forward. With more advanced vacuum heat treat technologies than any other manufacturer in the world, SECO/VACUUM was able to offer a total, comprehensive solution comprising multiple furnaces in multiple configurations to meet their needs for a clean, efficient future.

• Vector® single-chamber high-pressure gas quench (HPGQ) furnace, is the flexible choice to meet the needs of the many jobs in-house heat treating operations routinely perform. Vector is the single-chamber vacuum furnace of choice for toolmakers around the globe.
• ZeroFlow®, gas nitriding furnaces use only ammonia as a process gas, delivering precision nitriding potential with minimal gas emissions for clean, consistent, high quality results every time. Upgrading to clean ZeroFlow technology not only improves the customer’s process consistency, it allows them to reduce the environmental impact from their heat treatment activities.
• SECO/VACUUM’s tempering furnaces complete the loop by complementing the other vacuum technologies for high consistency and productivity. Integrating SECO/VACUUM tempering furnaces ensures technology compatibility as well as consistency in aftermarket support.

Tool and die manufacturers around the world are recognizing the unequivocal value of upgrading their operations with vacuum heat treatment technologies, and SECO/VACUUM makes it possible to source all-vacuum technologies from a single integrated supplier.In addition to basic environmental improvements – both in the plant and to the planet as a whole – tooling makers are recognizing the advantages of vacuum furnace technologies in increased productivity, more consistent tooling quality and performance, and savings to their bottom line.

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