Technology Transfer : From Lab to Shop Floor
A project by the students of Marathwada Institute of Technology, Aurangabad in the state of Maharashtra garnered tremendous attention from the industry fraternity at i2 Academia Pavilion, an IMTMA initiative at IMTEX Forming 2018. The attempt echoes the need for the industry and academic institutions to collaborate for each to be benefitted.
The transfer of a technology from a research laboratory to a manufacturing shop floor or an application is always a challenge. While institutes like IITs are routinely involved in the process, the government and private institutions have now realized its importance and have started moving in that direction.
Involving students in such projects immensely helps them to get ‘industry ready’ after their graduation. To make it possible, faculties in engineering institutes must acknowledge these needs and get connected with the industry.
One such project was undertaken by the students of Marathwada Institute of Technology, Aurangabad, Maharashtra, which bagged them the first prize in i2 Academia Pavilion at the recently held IMTEX Forming & Tooltech 2018, a premier exhibition on forming technologies at Bengaluru. i2 Academia Pavilion, an Indian Machine Tool Manufacturers’ Association (IMTMA) initiative, was held with the intent to get the industry and the academia on the same page.
In pursuit of a solution
The subject for the project was identified by undergraduate third year students of mechanical engineering during their visit to a rolling 
mill. The manufacturing of the rolled bar in the mill begins with the melting of scrap in an induction furnace followed by continuous casting of billets that consequently go through a number of roll passes to finish as bars of required diameter. During the rolling operation, high carbon high chromium steel slitters are used in the intermediate operation. A pair of slitters slits through the incoming hot stock into two bars. During the splitting, the splitters also get hot to around 150 to 200oC. These slitters are continuously water cooled so as to last longer. A couple of slitters last for the making of 400 metric tons (MT) steel bars before wearing out. A project was thought of to process these AISI D2 steel slitters cryogenically and to carry out the life assessment in the laboratory and also on the shop floor.
Cryogenic treatment of materials
Cryogenic processing (processing of materials below -150oC) is making inroads into the industries due to an extensive research being carried out since 1982 when Barron RF first tried this processing on different materials. Cryogenic treatment is the process of causing changes in materials by exposing them to cryogenic temperatures for a predetermined time period. Although the research could back up the effects of this treatment on different materials, the adoption of the process in the industries is still not up to the mark. Various benefits of this process have been supported by the research. Some of them are improvement in the wear resistance and surface roughness of tools and other alloy steels, polymers, aluminum alloys, composites etc.
If one searches the web, many research papers are available on the subject. However, it’s rare to find verification of the laboratory results on the actual application or the shop floor. While lab results in the research about the improvements are highly attractive, the benefit realization on the shop floor often creates debatable results. It’s very important to understand here that an engineering component during its manufacture undergoes various steps and each step contributes to the final attainment of the desired performance. It has been proven beyond doubt today that each heat treatment step of a steel component is interrelated and affects the final performance of the material.
Project execution
When the project on the AISI D2 slitters was executed, each step of the heat treatment was monitored for the parameters and the treatment conditions. It was also planned to assess the economic implications, as the results were to be applied to the manufacturing activity. This is an important factor at the interface of laboratory and the shop floor. The processor was designed and developed by one of the alumni of the institute. The imported cryogenic processors are exorbitantly priced. Therefore, the processor was indigenously developed suitable to the laboratory needs. This also motivated a student to convert it into a business activity as a start-up.
Lab evaluation
Samples for the lab evaluation were carved out of the slitters by EDM. The conventionally manufactured slitters and the samples were subjected to vacuum hardening and tempering in an industrial furnace. This material was further subjected to cryogenic treatment at -185oC for 36 hours by carefully adjusting the ramp down, soaking, and ramp up cycle. The treatment parameters and other necessary details are already in the literature available in plenty. A low temperature tempering cycle at 180oC for 2 hours was given to the slitters after the cryogenic treatment. The lab evaluation of wear was carried out by Pin on Disc testing machine. The weight loss was measured under standard conditions for untreated, cryogenically treated, at room temperature and at 150oC. It was observed that the improvement in the wear weight loss of the slitters was 53 percent for the room temperature test, and 71 percent for the wear test at 150oC. The improvement in the wear at elevated temperature can be attributed to additional precipitation of the Eta carbides.
The slitters were further subjected to the field test at the rolling mill. The capacity of the plant is to produce 22,000 MT of steel bars per month. The measurements were made for the depth of the ring of the slitters before and after the production of 400 MT of steel bars for both untreated and treated slitters. The worn-out depth of the cryogenically treated slitters was observed to be one third of the normal slitters. The weight loss in a slitter before and after the production of 400 MT of steel bars was also measured and the best result was the improvement by 70 percent for the cryogenically treated slitter. The outcome of the field test shows that the cryogenically treated couple of slitters can produce approximately 1200 MT of steel bars before wearing out. The requirement of slitters reduces drastically from 110 to 36 for a month of manufacturing. The cost calculations per ton of steel bars produced indicates that during normal working, a slitter costs `15 per ton of steel bars produced whereas a cryogenically treated slitter contributes only `5 per ton of steel bars produced. A net saving of `10 per ton of steel amounts to an annual saving of `26.4 lakh.
A worthwhile effort
In similar kind of studies, both in the laboratory and on the actual field, the results thus obtained can easily induce confidence in the industry to adopt a certain technology. It’s mainly students who will be benefitted of such an exposure to the industry to get prepared for the challenges in the journey ahead. The i2 Academia Pavilion initiative by IMTMA at IMTEX is a step in the direction to bridge the academia and the industry gap, and the effort is already bearing fruit.
HIGLIGHT : Involving students in such projects is of immense help to them to get ‘industry ready’. To facilitate this, faculties in engineering institutes must acknowledge this need and connect with the industry.
Dr CL Gogte
Professor
Marathwada Institute of Technology, Aurangabad
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