OUTLINING THE REQUIREMENTS The issue at hand was simple in nature, we needed to be able to provide much more metal, much more quickly and in a very consistent manner to meet the needs of new larger die-casting presses. So, at the core, the variables were basic, weight and time. As always with molten aluminum there were far more moving parts in the equation that also needed to be considered. Some of these related directly to the properties of the metal and some of these related to our equipment and how we could get it to do something that we had never asked it to do. Initial testing had to be done in a water tank, as it is impractical to start in a molten aluminum bath, we focused our efforts simply on how much water (by weight) we could move in a certain amount of time. The objective from the beginning was to be able to maintain a 1% or less variation in the weight of the water transferred. JEFF KELLER CEO Molten Metal Equipment Innovations ARTICLE TAKEAWAYS: • Aluminum Gigacasting are pushing boundaries in next generation of e-vehicles • Requires new tools in the toolbox from suppliers to improve productivity • More metal, higher consistency, and less variation Continued on next page 23 NEW DEMANDS REQUIRE NEW TOOLS IN THE TOOLBOX TECHNICAL TOOLBOX ISSUE A prominent business innovation leader said the other day something along the lines of “I have no issues with innovation, my mind generates more ideas than I can act on. My issue is execution.” The die casting industry has seen some significant innovation of late in ever larger presses capable of making ever larger parts and eliminating costly assembly, to further drive competitive advantage. The advent of gigacasting or megacasting technology has required the industry to develop new tools for the toolbox to support this type of production. This quote from Volvo is representative of how the automotive industry OEM’s are thinking about this trend. "The introduction of mega casting of aluminum body parts for the next generation of electric Volvo models is the most significant and exciting change implemented as part of the investment package. Mega casting creates a number of benefits in terms of sustainability, cost and car performance during the cars life time, and Volvo Cars is one of the first car makers to invest in this process.” Volvo is not alone, Tesla has been a leader in this new area and virtually all of the US, European, Chinese and Japanese OEM’s are implementing their own strategies to take advantage of the benefits it brings to automotive production. At Molten Metal Equipment Innovations, it caused us to go back to the drawing board, which in our case is a water tank, and get into testing and data gathering mode as we worked to support the needs of a new paradigm in diecasting. It refocused us on the core principles of our technology and how to create a new solution to a very important market need.
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