Keeping furnace downtime to an absolute minimum also means to be able to make the right choice of hot zone. In fact, the hot zone contributes to the performance of the whole system. It has an impact on the process quality, the temperature uniformity, the heating and cooling rates and the furnace's energy consumption. Therefore, which is the hot zone most economical and best performing based on losses and overall power costs? Graphite-based or all-metal design?

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This is the second part of the article on roughing pump operation in high-vacuum furnaces. It gives an overall picture of the situations due to malfunction of the pumping system. Nonetheless, it provides practical tips on how to deal with the presence of water in the pump, the formation of oil sludge, and the improper use of lubricated roughing pumps.

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Revision F of the AMS (Aerospace Material Specifications) 2750 introduces three important changes concerning the equipment of the instrumentation of the heat treatment furnaces.

Which are the changes to the uniformity requirements required by the technical specifications of the process and by the technical specifications of the material?
How are the types of instrumentation of heat treatment plants classified?
And finally, what is the new D+ instrumentation type?

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Stainless-steel components represent a large part of the market for sintered parts; they can be produced using many technologies and have a wide variety of applications such as automotive, biomedical industries, mechanical and fashion.

In this article we are going to discuss how sintering parameters, and especially the sintering atmosphere, may affect the quality achievable from sintered stainless-steel parts.
We’ll analyse the three gas options, and we’ll see that in some circumstances there are interesting alternatives that can fit your needs. Read on!

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As we all know, global events have led to a significant increase in energy cost in the past two years all over the world.

In Europe, current natural gas prices (February 2023) have more than doubled compared to the same period of 2020. In Italy, the cost of one MWh of electrical energy is about 3 times what the cost was just 1 year ago. Moreover, the strong price uncertainty makes difficult for companies to forecast the energy-related costs involved for the next few months.

Energy-intensive industries are largely impacted by price inflation; among them foundries, the metalworking industry and, of course, commercial heat treaters and companies performing in-house heat treatment of any sort.

Heating a load to a determined temperature for some time requires a certain amount of energy; whether that energy is generated from fossil fuel (coal, natural gas, petroleum) or renewable resources (solar power, wind power, hydropower), that is an inescapable reality.

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