Dateline Nashville

Hello from a cool and clear Texas,

Apologies for not having posted recently, but I've just been so darn tooting busy following up on all of the leads from the recent Investment Casting Institute meeting and exhibition.  The ICI is always a fun show and this years show was no disappointment.

 

It was great to catch up with our own Chris Collins and we both met up with Synchro's newest employee Daniel from Brazil.

 

As you can see we had a prime booth location on a corner, you have to pay extra for those - it's called location location location.... and Synchro's own sales and marketing director Barbara Nolan Collins did a splendid job of getting it all organized.

 

If you have never been to the Opryland Hotel and Resort before, one word, take your walking shoes with you.  This place is massive under roof and it's a long hike to get anywhere.  One needs to constantly reference a map to get between Point-A and Point-B and you will definitely get lost if you go from Point-B to Point-A.

Next up is the Texas AFS meeting in Lubbock coming up in a few short weeks.

Until next time, see you on down the road.

Shane Allen

Head of Synchro ERP North American Operations

 

Ode to a Foundryman and a Dear Friend Pat Hale

I lost a near and dear friend last night, Pat Hale.  He and I worked at Texas Foundries for many years, he was the cost accountant.  He taught me all I know about costing and estimating.  We came up with some pretty darn good models.  We were also golfing buddies and camping buddies.  I will miss him.  Here is a story I sent out this morning to all of the TFers and family of his.  He leaves behind a wife and children and grand children...  He  was let go from the foundry in one of the first waves of layoffs.  I often think that the foundry ended up being bulldozed over, after an auction of pennies on the dollar, because they let one of the most important people go - the keeper of the costing and estimating models.  After his untimely departure, there was no one minding the store regarding costing and estimating and things were running amok. The models were dead and costing and estimating became a seat of the pants guesstimate, primarily based on cents per pound. 

I've lost a very good friend and a golfing and camping buddy.  We had a lot of good times together over the years.  Pat and I went camping back in 2001 up to the Buffalo river in Arkansas one HOT July 4th weekend.  Pat didn't want to leave until after the fireworks in Lufkin, so we got a late start in the convertible.  I remember distinctly that we stopped at IHOP along the way for coffee, gosh, Pat loved his coffee, and at the IHOP a drunk cowboy kiddo was dancing on the table - can't remember the kiddos name - in fact, I meant to ask Pat as I'm sure he would remember.  We got to the camping spot early the next morning and it came a downpour.  Poor Pat, his tent had a river run through it and his sleeping bag and pillow were soaked.  He slept in the car and we hightailed it to a laundry mat to dry them off.  We had a great time, but it was blazing hot.  We did a short canoe trip, low water, and it just wasn't that fun.  We spent the next day touring around and went to a very COOL cave and took the tour.  We had to drive a long ways to get beer.  Then the night before we left, a raccoon raided our camp food we had left sitting out.

I have a lot of found memories of Pat.  We worked very closely together at TF.  We played a lot of golf together over the years and had a hoot.  Neither one of us were very good, but we had a good time and that is all that mattered.  He had this habit of driving the golf cart and then hitting the ball, then walking up to hit it again, and again - and soon he was 50-100 yards from the cart and had to walk back to get it.  Always made me smile.

Pat was one of those people that would make you smile and I am forever grateful for his friendship - in good times as in bad.  I will miss him.

He had called me several weeks ago and left a message and I had called him back and left messages.  Playing telephone tag.  Most unfortunately we didn't get to catch up before his passing.

 

 Here are some pics from the long ago canoe and camping trip.

 

Music City USA

Good early morning from Texas where the weather is cool!

Fall has definitely arrived, an early fall.  We are not used to these cool temperatures, even in early October.  We know this as a "false fall".  Mother nature is just teasing us with unseasonably cool temperatures, I've already had to break out a long sleeve shirt and sweat pants!

Anyway, Music City USA - NASHVILLE TENNESSEE!  The ICI, Investment Casting Institute, is holding the annual conclave at the OpryLand USA  complex and it should be a hum dinger. 

Please by all means, be sure to stop by booth #313 and visit Chris Collins, MD/CEO, and myself.  BTW-MD is NOT Medical Doctor but is Managing Director.  First time I ever talked to Chris I was perlexed as to why a Medical Doctor was running a foundry software company.  The Managing Director is not a typical USA title.

SEE:  59th Annual Technical Conference and Expo

Until next time, see you down the road in Nashville!

Shane Allen
Head of North American Operations

NTSB Recommendations for GEnx-1B and -2B engines

Hello from a soggy Texas, where we got almost 10" of rain Saturday into Sunday morning,

Grabbed from the headlines "

Emergency Inspections Recommended For Dreamliner Engines

 

NTSB Urges Action After Engine Failures in New Boeing 787, 747 Airliners (National Transportation Safety Board)

Any time I see articles about aircraft and problems, I have a special curiosity from the standpoint of a metalcaster. Quality is so paramount in the production of aircraft and airframe castings that I look to see if a casting was involved in the problem.  Bad castings have caused airplanes to fall from the sky.  SEE: 

United Airlines Flight 232

..which resulted in the failure to detect a fatigue crack originating from a previously undetected
metallurgical defect located in a critical area of the stage 1 fan disk that was manufactured by General Electric Aircraft Engines."

"Examination of the fan disk did indeed solve the mystery. Investigators discovered an impurity and fatigue crack in the disk, and traced this defect all the way back to the initial ingot formation in 1971. Titanium when melted reacts with air which creates impurities; to prevent this, the ingot which would become the fan disk was formed using a "double vacuum" process: the raw materials were melted together in a vacuum, allowed to cool and solidify, then melted in a vacuum once more. Afterwards, the ingot was shaped into a billet, a sausage-like form about 16 inches in diameter, and tested using ultrasound to look for defects. Defects were located and the ingot was further processed to remove them. Unfortunately, some contamination remained.[1]

The contamination caused what is known as a hard alpha inclusion, a brittle part of the metal, which cracked during forging and then fell out during final machining. This formed a cavity with microscopic cracks at the edges. For the next 18 years, the crack grew slightly each time the engine was powered up and brought to operating temperature. Eventually the crack grew large enough to cause structural failure of the disk.[1]

From what I've read regarding this current issue with the brand new Dreamliner engine is that the root cause of the failure maybe related to the coating of the engine part and not the casting itself. However, whatever metalcaster made this part had to wince when they heard about problems.

Synchro ERP can help the metalcaster track the entire casting from the molding process all the way to the shipping dock with unique identifier / serial number tracking.  Additionally, Synchro provides the ability to track CAR's - Corrective Action Reporting as well as a full fledged chemical and physical properties quality system.

Until next time, happy flying and see you on down the road in Nashville for the ICI!

Shane Allen
Head of Synchro ERP North American Operations