Do you ever wonder what garners the most attention on our website? Are you curious what your peers are looking at? Do you think, “How many people read that article?” If you answered “yes” to any of those questions, this is the place you want to be.

QuesTek Innovations LLC and the German Aerospace Center, in a joint effort, will explore the full potential of QuesTek’s new printable aluminum (Al) alloy, which was developed for additive manufacturing (AM). The alloy is capable of high-strength performance at elevated temperatures (200-300°C/392-572°F) in the as-built condition. It is believed to be the first powdered AI material to meet those requirements without the need for subsequent heat treatment. The alloy will enable the printing of lighter-weight precision components not currently possible with traditional manufacturing methods, including heat exchangers or other components requiring internal cooling channels.

Stack Metallurgical Group, after installing a hot isostatic press (HIP) earlier this year, is redoubling its commitment to the technology with the addition of a second HIP from Quintus Technologies. The unit has a work zone of 26 inches (660 mm) in diameter and 68.9 inches (1,750 mm) in height. It follows the installation in January of a high-capacity Mega-HIP, which has a work zone of 63 inches (1,600 mm) in diameter and 102 inches (2,591 mm) in height. The new press, which operates at a maximum temperature of 2552°F (1400°C) and a maximum pressure of 30,000 psi (2,070 bar), will be installed at Stack’s recently completed facility in Albany, Ore. Both systems are equipped with the Quintus proprietary uniform rapid cooling (URC) feature, which combines HIP and heat treatment in a single process.

Carpenter Technology Corp. opened its 500,000-square-foot Emerging Technology Center (ETC) in Athens, Ala. It will provide the capability to atomize a range of specialty alloys into metal powder and manufacture the powder into finished parts using AM technology (3D metal printing). The ETC’s downstream equipment for taking the initially produced part to a final finished product includes a hot isostatic press (HIP) system and vacuum heat treating to optimize the material properties of high-value specialty alloy components. Carpenter Technology has invested approximately $40 million to date in the ETC and is expected to create about 60 jobs over the next five years.

Ipsen USA was awarded an order to supply a West Coast aerospace customer with four 2-bar vacuum furnaces that will be used for heat treating additively manufactured parts in full-scale production. The furnaces have a load size of 36 inches wide x 36 inches high x 48 inches deep and can process up to 3,000 pounds. Ipsen shipped two of the furnaces in November and will ship the remaining two in January.

The ExOne Company is expanding its collaboration with Elnik Systems, a provider of debind and sinter equipment, and DSH Technologies, a provider of debind and sinter process consulting, to improve standardization of sintering for metals 3D printed with binder jetting. The expanded collaboration will focus on improving sintering profiles for metal parts 3D printed on ExOne binder-jetting systems. Standard profiles will be based on metal type and part features, including size, mass and other geometric elements. The companies will also co-develop an easy-to-use interface that will automatically load, or allow a user to select, sintering profiles.

Through a multiyear endeavor, Fabrisonic has been working with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to develop and qualify ultrasonic additive manufacturing (UAM) heat exchanger devices.

Solar Manufacturing shipped a vacuum furnace for processing additively manufactured parts to a large science and technology laboratory. The lab requires the furnace, which has a maximum temperature of 2400°F (1315°C), to further their research and development work. Built with Solar Manufacturing’s SolarVac Polaris control system and a graphite-insulated hot zone, the furnace is designed to accommodate loads up to 36 inches wide x 36 inches high x 48 inches deep with a maximum weight of 5,000 pounds.

GE Additive entered into a five-year cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). The agreement focuses on processes, materials and software to drive industrialization and encourage the broader adoption of additive-manufacturing (AM) technology. The agreement supersedes an existing CRADA in place since 2012 between ORNL and GE Additive Arcam EBM. ORNL purchased its first Arcam EBM system in 2009. Since that time, ORNL and the Arcam EBM teams have worked together to create opportunities for companies in multiple U.S. manufacturing sectors to adopt electron-beam melting (EBM) technology. 

Just as we’ve done in the past with other topics, Industrial Heating will take a look at the most-viewed Vacuum/Surface Treating articles (in terms of page views) on our website. Data was collected for 12 months, from August 2018 to August 2019.