US Air Force Materials Expert Receives The Jaap Schijve Award (US)

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Dr. Adam Pilchak has emerged as the United States Air Force’s leading expert in microstructural fatigue and damage tolerance of titanium alloys, which are used worldwide in military and commercial aerospace systems.

The Jaap Schijve Award is an international award presented by The Netherlands Aerospace Centre NLR and Delft University of Technology to promote the disciplines of fatigue and damage tolerance for aerospace applications. Dr. Adam Pilchak of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base is this year’s recipient of the Jaap Schijve award. The award is based on technical contributions to the advancement of the field of aeronautical fatigue. The award is selected from young researchers all over the world who are early in their career – preferablyContinue reading→

U.S-Hired Firm Audits Russia’s Rusal For Compliance With Sanctions Deal (US)

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MOSCOW (Reuters) – A firm hired by the U.S. Treasury Department is auditing Russian aluminum giant Rusal to check whether it is complying with the terms of a deal under which Washington agreed to lift sanctions on the company, Rusal said. The audit is the first glimpse of how Treasury is policing whether Rusal and its parent company En+ are adhering to the deal – in particular the stipulation that Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska’s control over the business be severed. A source familiar with the situation said the audit included checks on the telephone and email records of a small circle of Rusal senior executives and board members to establish whether they remained in contact Continue reading→

Universal Alloys Corporation To Build in Vietnam The First Aerospace Components Factory (US)

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The construction of Vietnam’s first aerospace component factory in Da Nang city begins on March 29. 

The Universal Alloys Corporation ASIA PTE., LTD (UAC) and the People’s Committee of the central city of Da Nang on March 29 started the construction of an aerospace component factory in the city. The Sunshine factory, the first of its kind in Vietnam, has a registered investment of 170 million USD and aims to produce and install aerospace components from aluminum alloys and composite in service of the industry. It will turn out about 4,000 out of the 5 million aircraft components, all for export. The factory is scheduled to achieve an export value of 25 million USD inContinue reading→

HY-100 the oustanding steel of the U.S. Navy’s Seawolf-Class Submarine (US)

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To combat the threat of the Soviet’s Akula class, the U.S. Navy responded with the Seawolf class of nuclear attack submarines. The Seawolf submarines were designed with HY-100 steel alloy hulls  two inches thick , the better to withstand the pressures of deep diving. HY-100 steel is roughly  20 percent stronger  than the HY-80 used in the Los Angeles class. As a result, the submarines are capable of diving to depths of up to two thousand feet, and crush depth estimates run from 2,400 to 3,000 feet.

he extreme quietness of the Seawolf class gave the Navy the idea of modifying the last submarine, USS Jimmy Carter, to support clandestine operations. An extra one hundred feet was added to the hull, a section known as the  Multi-Mission Platform  (MMP). The MMP gives Carter the ability to send and recover Remotely Operated Vehicles/Unmanned Underwater Vehicles and SEALs and diving teams while submerged. It includes berthing for up to fifty SEALs or other attached personnel. Carter also features auxiliary maneuvering devices fore and aft for precise maneuvering in situations such as undersea cable tapping and other acts of espionage.Continue reading→

US Navy invents zinc-free anode enhanced by ‘very small addition of tin (US)

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A U.S. Navy research team has discovered an alloy for making better, cheaper underwater anodes with the potential for shifting the global business of maintaining ships and piers. A patent application was published by the federal government on Thursday for the new aluminum anode alloy containing a “very small addition of tin.” It was invented by Craig Matzdorf and Alan Grieve of the Naval Air Warfare Center’s Aircraft Division in Maryland. Sacrificial anodes are attached to marine vessels and structures to protect them from corrosion caused by the flow of electrons between metal surfaces like iron, steel, and aluminum. When submerged in seawater, these metals form a battery. Many anodes are made of alloys consisting mostly of zinc, a metal that can easily absorb the electrons Continue reading→

US Army Air Force Engineers Focus on Metals Research (US)

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Engineers at the Air Force Research Laboratory are exploring new metals and metal processing techniques for use in future aerospace applications. (Credit Photo @Air Force Research Laboratory)

Carbon-fiber composite materials have been the darling of the aerospace industry in recent years. But, metal still plays a critical role in commercial and military aircraft, especially for applications that involve high temperatures or high stresses, such as engines and landing gear. Engineers at the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) are exploring new metals and new metal processing techniques for use in hotter, faster and more efficient aircraft and spacecraft being developed for future combat missions. “Until you can make a jet engine out of anything else, metals Continue reading→

US Department of Defense, grants research for detecting structural damage in high-strength ship-building materials (US)

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Haiying Huang, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at The University of Texas at Arlington, has earned a pair of grants worth nearly $900,000 to monitor structural health and detect when and where damage happens. Using a $599,928 grant from the Department of Defense, Huang will attempt to design ultrasound transducers, devices that convert mechanical vibrations to electrical signals or vice versa, that can be glued to ships’ hulls to detect and monitor material degradation that causes corrosions on high-strength ship-building materials. These material degradations are microscale in size and usually cover the entire surface of the hull. If they are not treated, they can cause the alloys to break down and impact the ship’s seaworthiness. Huang’s research will focus on degradations that are early in their development, when they are so small that they are undetectable by Continue reading→

3-D printed tool cuts through titanium, wins innovation prize (US)

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Jimmy Toton inspects a 3D printed steel milling cutter. (Credit Photo@RMIT University)

Ph.D. candidate Jimmy Toton from RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, has won the 2019 Young Defence Innovator Award and $15,000 prize at the Avalon International Airshow for the research, which was conducted with Defence Materials Technology Centre (DMTC) and industry partner Sutton Tools. Because the metals used in Defence and aerospace are so strong, making high quality tools to cut them is a major, and expensive, challenge. This collaborative project conducted at RMIT’s Advanced Manufacturing Precinct is the first convincing demonstration of 3-D printed steel tools that can cut titanium alloys as well as, or in some cases better than, conventional steel tools. “Now that we’ve shown what’s possible, the full potential of 3-D printing can start being applied to this Continue reading→

WeAre Group investit 15 millions d’euros dans sa nouvelle usine de Montauban (FR)

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Le sous-traitant aéronautique WeAre Group va créer 200 emplois supplémentaires, d’ici 2023, sur son nouveau site de Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne).

Le sous-traitant aéronautique WeAre Group s’apprête à déménager son usine historique de Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne) sur un nouveau site, entièrement réaménagé, toujours à Montauban. 15 millions d’euros d’investissement accompagnent cette opération. 200 emplois supplémentaires devraient être créés d’ici 2023.

Trop à l’étroit dans les 11 000 m² de locaux qu’il occupe à Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne), le sous-traitant aéronautique WeAreGroup, devraient bientôt tourner une nouvelle page de son histoire. D’ici quelques mois, son siège et son usine tarn-et-garonnaise seront relocalisés sur un nouveau site à quelques kilomètres de là, mais toujours sur la commune de Montauban. Une enveloppe globale de 15 millions d’euros est prévue, dont 11 millionsContinue reading→

ATI-Tsingshan JV under Regulatory Microscope for National Security (US)

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US. Specialty Metals Amendment prohibits using non-U.S. melted specialty metals for U.S. Defense applications. “No items for the defense industry are produced by the joint venture due to the commodity-product capability of the Midland plant.”according to Natalie Gillespie, a spokeswoman for ATI.

A group of grass-roots conservative leaders led by Morton Blackwell of the Weyrich Group and Jenny Beth Martin of Tea Party Patriots has just sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin demanding an immediate security review of a joint venture between a Pittsburgh specialty steel maker and a Chinese firm that is the world’s largest stainless steel producer. Allegheny Technologies hopes to use the joint venture to import 336,000 metric tons of stainless steel slabs every year from an Indonesian mill owned by China’s Tsingshan Group. The slabs – which would be free of any tariffs – would then be turned into 60-inch-wide steel sheets. About 100 new jobs would be created at an Allegheny plant in Midland, Pennsylvania. The conservative leaders say the joint venture between Allegheny and Tsingshan hasn’t yet been reviewed by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). “China’s history of stealthy intellectual property theft triggers immediate concerns,” they write. “ATI possesses sensitive intellectual property that China could seek to extract and transfer in order to undercut U.S.economic and military advantages.” The conservative leaders point out that in 2014, hackers from the Chinese People’s Liberation Army were charged with cyber intrusions and economic espionage aimed at three U.S. steel producers, including Allegheny. The concern over such espionage is heightened because Allegheny hasContinue reading→