As post-pandemic business gets back to normal, it may be time to update your furnace equipment, possibly through a retrofit.

The University of Strathclyde’s Advanced Forming Research Centre (AFRC), part of the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland, is opening an office in Sheffield, United Kingdom, to provide local forging and forming houses with easy access to support from the research center located near Glasgow Airport in Scotland. Supported by Sheffield City Council and operating out of an office on the Olympic Legacy Park, the AFRC’s new base will effectively bring the research lab directly to the manufacturers. The office will help South Yorkshire companies tap into leading metallurgy capabilities, numerical and analytical process modeling tools, and some of the most advanced industry-scale forging and forming equipment in the world over 260 miles away in Scotland.

After a longer-than-normal, COVID-19-related hiatus, FIA will resume its Forge Fair cycle. Forge Fair 2021 will be held at Detroit’s TCF Center starting October 26 and ending on October 28. This article will give you all the pertinent information to start planning your Forge Fair experience.

The U.K.’s Sheffield Forgemasters is being acquired by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to support a substantial recapitalization of the company’s defense-critical plant and equipment over the next 10 years. The investment will secure Sheffield Forgemasters’ role as a critical supplier to the next generation of U.K. defense programs while continuing its independent commercial activities, serving markets such as civil nuclear, oil and gas, power generation, renewables and steel processing.

Automation within forges and heat-treating facilities often consists of individually controlled processes for individual pieces of equipment, such as furnace heating or press operation cycles. Individual processes can be controlled at a Level I protocol. Full cell automation consolidates these automated steps and implements a central Level II control system, which is designed using a combination of Windows services and model-view-controller (MVC) architecture.

In today’s rapidly changing environment, finding the right marketing message and taking the correct actions can be challenging. As a result of the pandemic, the world looks much different than it did at the beginning of 2020. Manufacturers are trying to mitigate COVID-19’s economic fallout, ensure employee and workplace safety and keep supply chains moving.

ABB signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Hitachi Construction Machinery to share their expertise and collaborate in bringing solutions to market that will reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with heavy machinery in mining. The companies will explore possibilities to apply ABB’s electrification, automation and digital solutions to mining trucks and excavators provided by Hitachi Construction Machinery as part of wider efforts with mine operators to electrify all processes from pit to port.

This is a complete list of all the feature articles that appeared in FORGE, by month, in 2020. All articles are hyperlinked for your convenience.

Additive manufacturing (AM) has rapidly evolved since its inception, and investment in AM technology has flourished in both the public and private sectors. This article, the first of two parts, evaluates predictions made in FORGE in 2012 and illustrates some appropriate applications that could affect (or already have affected) forging processes and markets.