FW Gartner Thermal Spraying, Houston, and South Africa’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) have signed a licensing agreement on a laser cladding technology developed at CSIR. The agreement follows the earlier development of a novel laser-based process for the cladding of steel processing rolls, a key component in steelmaking, CSIR said. The technology was tested and proven at ArcelorMittal’s Vanderbijlpark plant over the past five years.
Engineers at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., dropped an old Marine CH-46E helicopter fuselage filled with 15 dummy occupants from a height of about 30 ft to test improved seats and seatbelts and gather data on the odds of surviving a helicopter crash. They used cables to hoist the helicopter fuselage with its mock passengers into the air and swing it to the ground, much like a pendulum.
Solar Atmospheres of California (SCA), Fontana, is now an approved supplier for Rolls Royce and Pratt & Whitney aircraft engine manufacturers. In addition to these prime approvals, SCA has expanded its Boeing approvals to include BAC 5616, BAC 5617, BAC 5619, DPS 5.00 LOW, DPS 5.00 HIGH, and DPS 6.33. Solar’s Southern California facility was built to service the aerospace industry.
Assembly of the backbone of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, the primary mirror backplane support structure, is a step closer to completion with the recent addition of the backplane support frame, a fixture that will be used to connect all the pieces of the telescope together. The backplane support frame brings together Webb’s center section and wings, secondary mirror support structure, aft optics system, and integrated science instrument module.
Schuler Group, Canton, Mich., offers a heat-treating technology called press-hardening to increase the strength of steel parts. In this technology, blanks or pre-formed parts are heated in a furnace to a temperature of 930°C, then placed into the press as quickly as possible, within just 10-12 seconds. The press remains closed for a few additional seconds during the forming process. During this time, the parts are cooled and hardened. The cycle times range from 8 to 30 seconds.
