Metal | Steel, Alloy & Precious Metal Materials

WERKSTOFFE + VERFAHREN

Details: Released: 15.09.2017; Last updated: 03.10.2024; Hits: 10553

Metal is a fundamental material for industry, offering exceptional strength, formability and conductivity. Steel, as the most important construction material, alloys for specialized applications and Precious metals for their corrosion resistance and conductivity are found everywhere. Their versatility and performance drive innovations in construction, electronics and mechanical engineering.

Smartsteel Steel with AI

Content

Aluminum alloy for 3D printing of aircraft components
Smart Steel Technologies expands KI solutions for steel production
Comprehensive corrosion protection for steel in Kristal Solar Park
New steel for gears with up to 60% more strength
Key technologies for flexible metal displays
50 percent higher impact energy of high-alloy steel
Smart Big Data makes the steel industry fit for the future

Additional contributions

Aluminum alloy for 3D printing of aircraft components

The new aluminum alloy F357 from SLM Solutions meets the requirements of the aerospace industry.

01.09.2020 | Honeywell and SLM Solutions present a great success as part of their development partnership for the qualification of aluminum components with higher layer thicknesses. Newly developed parameter sets for the aluminum alloy F357 lead to significantly improved Materialproperties compared to the die-cast component.

The cooperation between Honeywell and SLM Solutions announced in 2019 aims to improve the production of Aircraft components Reduce production times and costs using SLM technology. The new beryllium-free variant of AlSi7Mg0,6 meets the high requirements of the aerospace industry.

As part of the cooperation, Honeywell began qualifying aluminum components with thicker layers of 60 and 90 µm on the Selective laser melting Machine SLM-500. SLM Solutions made its standard aluminum parameter sets available to Honeywell for qualifying the material using the quad laser systems. This enables optimal material properties to be achieved.

Important milestone reached with F357

The development of the new parameter sets for the aluminum alloy F357 has now reached an important milestone. With a layer thickness of 60 µm and a 700 W laser configuration, the material properties were compared to die castingcomponents significantly improved.

The new aluminum alloy is particularly light. Compared to conventional aluminum alloys, it also offers significantly higher corrosion resistance. She reached a high strength in a wide temperature range. The alloy has a high Weldability and can be reworked very well. F357 is very suitable for mechanical or electrochemical processing such as anodizing.

3D printing process | manufacturing of the future

Thanks to these properties, the aluminum alloy in 3D Print very good at producing thin walls and complex structures. This makes the aluminum alloy ideal for aerospace or Automotive industry"In particular, the open system architecture and the associated high level of flexibility as well as the possibility of customizing parameter sets offers enormous advantages," says dr Soren Wiener, Senior Director Technology and Advanced Operations at Honeywell Aerospace. "With this strategy and the great support from SLM Solutions, we are making progress in achieving our next goals."

Benjamin Hass, Product Manager Materials & Parameters at SLM Solutions explains: “It is a privilege to work with one of the leading aerospace companies. In this way we can learn a lot from each other. All our customers benefit from the industry-proven and perfectly tailored solutions. "

Smart Steel Technologies expands KI solutions for steel production

07.11.2019 | Smart Steel Technologies is the only provider in the world that already provides concrete, operational AI solutions for steel production. These are primarily aimed at temperature optimization, reducing casting errors and improving quality control. LEA Partners is now investing 2,1 million euros in optimizing the processes.

With his AI-based software Smart Steel Technologies is making established steel production more efficient and sustainable. Existing AI models are optimized based on historical production data. The temperature and thus energy consumption and CO2 emissions can be reduced without costly tests. The software determines causal relationships between process parameters and the quality achieved. Measures derived from this lead to a sustainable increase in quality. To achieve this, the company relies on a team of experienced metallurgy and AI experts.

Through the growth financing of LEA Partners, the company, which was founded at the beginning of 2019 in Berlin, receives support from an investor for the first time.

Comprehensive corrosion protection for steel in Kristal Solar Park

Corrosion-resistant steel from Wuppermann protects Kristal Solar Park from corrosion. 16.07.2019 | The Kristal Solar Park is the largest photovoltaic plant in the Benelux countries. It is connected to the Wuppermann supplied corrosion-protected steel on a secure foundation. The Z1200 coated steel has a zinc layer of 1200 g/m and is rolled into piles by Voestalpine Sadef as an essential component of its “Fastslide” solar mounting system.

Even under the harshest environmental conditions and the most varied soil conditions, a layer of 85 µm pure Zinc on both sides of the steel for long-term profitability of the solar system. Only due to the thick zinc layer, which leads to an exceptionally high level of corrosion protection, are solar park operators able to use soils with difficult conditions for renewable energy generation.

The Crystal Solar Park will have a capacity of 100 MW and cover an area the size of about 200 football fields. The project is located near the town of Lommel in eastern Belgium and will cover the entire energy needs of the Nyrstar zinc smelter.

Continuously galvanized steel has the great advantage that the profiles can be delivered to the site immediately after molding. In addition to piece-galvanized material also eliminates the post-processing.

New steel for gears with up to 60% more strength

GWJ steel gear 20.03.2019 | GWJ Technology integrated as the world's first manufacturer of professional calculation software for gear transmission high-purity steels from Ovako from Sweden. In close cooperation, the two high-purity steels 159X and 159Q were implemented in the gear modules for spur gears. They are based on case hardening steel 18CrNiMo7-6.

Due to significantly lower levels of impurities, these steels have modified Wöhler curves. This makes them comparable in the static range with the 18CrNiMo7-6However, in the fatigue strength range, 159Q offers approximately 30% higher performance for flank load-bearing capacity and 60% higher strength for tooth root load-bearing capacity. These higher fatigue strength values are based on internal Ovako studies and were verified with tests at the WZL in Aachen and the FZG in Munich.

The steel 159X has a slightly smaller increase in performance compared to the 18CrNiMo7-6 and is therefore well suited for the necessary improvement of existing designs. The potential of the 159Q can be used particularly in new designs. It can be advantageous to focus on an optimized Scuffing load capacity This generally results in better gear efficiency and thus lower power losses. From GWJ Technology's point of view, these Ovako steels open up completely new possibilities for gears and have a high potential for further improving the performance of Geargears and gear components.

The two steels 159X and 159Q are available in all three GWJ software solutions for gear calculation, ie in the web solution "Eassistant", in the desktop application TBK and in the special software "Gear Engineer" for 5 gear cutting.

Key technologies for flexible metal displays

Tanaka flexible metal 29.10.2018 | Tanaka Precious Metals has developed a technology for wiring developed from nanosilver for the production of flexible touch displays with high image quality on film substrates. A new nanosilver ink, which can be sintered at as little as 70 °C, is suitable both for printing invisible circuit paths on plastics and for producing flexible metal films for etching using the ITO process.

People have been talking about them for years, but you can’t buy them yet: We’re talking about smartphones with flexible displaysThe first models are expected to appear in 2020, perhaps even as early as 2019. Before that happens, there are still a number of technological hurdles to overcome. The biggest hurdle: producing touch-sensitive displays that are also flexible, with the same or better optical properties.

With the expensive technology used today ITO technology, in which conductor tracks are etched into a glass substrate, a display would break immediately when bent. Two new technologies from the precious metals specialist overcome these disadvantages and bring the production of smartphones with flexible displays within reach.

Invisible to the eye

In the first technology, the conductor tracks for the touch function are fine metal mesh printed with a silver-containing ink. Other companies have also already developed metal fabric sensors, but the conductor tracks are up to 7 µm wide and are therefore visible to the naked eye and disruptive. Tanaka's process creates conductor tracks that are well under 4 µm micrometers wide, making them invisible to the naked eye - the image quality is higher, as is the durability.

Previous printing processes only worked at temperatures above 130 °C and therefore did not work on heat-sensitive Plastics like PET. The manufacturer has succeeded in reducing the temperature for sintering to 70 °C. The Secret is in the ink, which contains small nanoparticles of silver between 10 and 100 nm in high concentrations, as well as in a new processing process. The technology is suitable for fast and cost-effective roll-to-roll processes in which displays are printed on film webs.

The display manufacturer also provides a second technology for those who want to continue using the ITO process in order to avoid major investments. The nanosilver ink is used here to produce large-area Silver Films that can be etched using ITO processes – but on flexible substrates, as required for flexible displays.

50 percent higher impact energy of high-alloy steel

Steeltec impact work high-alloy steel 15.09.2017 | Steeltec (Schmolz + Bickenbach) now offers users of high-alloy steel a solution that combines high performance with price stability. The subsidiary of the Schmolz+Bickenbach Group applies its Xtreme Performance Technology (XTP) to precipitation-hardening ferritic-pearlitic (AFP) steels. The resulting fine grain increases the impact energy at room temperature by more than 50% to up to 150 J while maintaining high strength.

When high strength and toughness are required, are AFP steels from now on a competitive alternative to nickel and molybdenum alloyed materials - provided that the materials have passed the controlled thermomechanical process management at Steeltec.

Impact work opens up new performance potential

By applying XTP to the AFP steel you can AutomobileSuppliers and machine builders develop new performance potential with these materials. The material 38MnV6 XTP exhibits a Notched impact strength of more than 150 J. and thus a high level of toughness.

The strength of the Materials can up to 950 MPa increase. These properties can be transferred to semi-hot forged components. In the case of a forged product, for example, after forming at temperatures of 700 ° C a 50% higher notched impact strength determined than with the standard material 38MnVs6.

The XTP steel attributes of the material thus contribute to long-lasting machine components. End customers benefit from a price stable and thus competitive Steel - a result that is possible without the use of price-volatile alloy elements with an increase in the impact energy.

Hot-work steel tested in die-casting moulds

07.05.2015 | Schmolz + Bickenbach Group has expanded its range of products. Now there is hot-work steel ThermodurE 40 K Superclean in all dimensions from 800 x 100 to 800 x 400 mm - also machined on request. Nemak is currently testing the steel as a material for the inserts of die-casting molds in which 4-cylinder engine blocks will later be manufactured.

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Smart Big Data makes the steel industry fit for the future

Software AG Big Data Steel 08.04.2015 | Smart factories In addition to the actual production goods, they produce, above all, huge amounts of data that are continuously exchanged between self-controlling workpieces, sensors, machines and systems.

These have enormous potential, provided they are evaluated in real time using big data analysis and incorporated into production, planning and maintenance processes. The Software AG using a simulated Industry 4.0 production process at the Bitkom stand.

Great potential for Big Data The German steel industry offers this. In the increasingly networked production environments in which the high-tech product steel is produced, materials are measured with lasers and checked for material irregularities using video cameras, and vibrations and temperature fluctuations are monitored by a large number of sensors.

In order to extract important information from the resulting immense amounts of data, Results for production processes To filter out these problems, software is used for the complex analysis of large data streams. With the software company's technology, manufacturing companies can, for example, optimize maintenance intervals. To do this, data from various sources is aggregated, linked and analyzed - sensor data from the machines, data from production and logistics, spare parts and the work schedules of the service technicians. This reduces downtime, which overall contributes to optimizing the supply chain. This enables manufacturing companies to save costs, increase the flexibility of their production processes and the quality of their products.

Source: This article is based on information from the following companies: GWJ, Honeywell, Schmolz & Bickenbach, SLM, Smartsteel, Software AG, Tanaka, Wuppermann.