The Birth of a Lubricant

I frequently am asked where we get ideas for new-product development. Many of the ideas come from our customers asking for a better lubricant. This is the story of one such idea—a new lubricant developed as a custom formulation to meet the requirements of a metalforming customer.

Understanding the Customer’s Needs

In 2005, Orchid International, Monroe, WI, asked us to take

With more than 227,000 sq. ft. under roof, the Orchid International plant in Monroe, WI, specializes in the production of lamination stampings as well as motor die castings and general metal stampings and assemblies. Stampings are produced on more than 30 high-speed presses, and the facility operates four annealing ovens with a total capacity of more than 20,000 lb./hr.

a look at its metalforming-lubrication requirements. It was using a soluble oil to lubricate motor and electrical lamination stampings running at speeds to 750 strokes/ min. Employees were mixing the lubricant at 20:1 with city water with a hardness of 18 grains/gal., and it formed a stable emulsion with very good corrosion protection. The plant also needed to use a second product for lubricating prepainted steel used to manufacture ballast boxes and covers, and for galvanized steel used for an assortment of brackets. The soluble oil failed to work on these materials because of residue, staining and corrosion issues, so Orchid had to use a second product—a semi-synthetic lube mixed at a 10:1 ratio.

Orchid came to us hoping to use one die lube for all of its pressroom applications. This would better-suit its central mixing station piped to each press, designed to deliver one product. Using only one lube also would solve problems with its recycling program—it had been mixing both lubricants together in recycling, and could only use the recycled mixture on certain jobs.

The plant had been satisfied with tool life using its previous lubricants, so the new product needed only to provide equal or better tool life, as well as be compatible with the carbide tooling used in its high-speed lamination dies. Rusty laminations presented a costly problem for the plant, and occurred randomly throughout the year, so Orchid looked to improve corrosion protection. Laminations are annealed at 1600 F for 6 hr., so the firm requires that the lubricant residue burn off clean and not cause the laminations to stick together.

The facility does not clean its stampings, so lubricant residue must be compatible with its customers’ manufacturing processes. Materials processed include laminations from M-33 cold-rolled steel, M-6 and M-9 grain-oriented, and silica steels. Other materials stamped include black, white, brown and green prepainted steel, galvanized steels, hot-rolled steel and tin plate. In every case, lubricant must provide corrosion and stain protection, and leave an acceptable residue.

Product Development

Our lubricant-development laboratory decided to use a synthetic, since Orchid wanted to avoid having to wash the parts, and it needed a clean burn-off during annealing. Next on the priority list was to develop a lubricant to handle the most critical application—the motor and electrical lamination stampings. Here the lubricant needed to protect the tool for millions of hits between sharpenings; be compatible with the carbide tooling; not interfere in the annealing process; and provide rust protection to lamination stacks.

The lab concluded that a new lubricant would have to be developed to meet all of these requirements, under the guidance of a senior product-development chemist. The resulting lubricant has a newly developed corrosion-inhibitor package that proved successful during lamination-stack stain and filter-paper stain tests, using test coupons cut from M-33 cold-rolled steel, M-6 grain-oriented steel, and galvanized and black prepainted steel. This formula, initially dubbed LS-P-388, was proved out via laboratory testing, and also put through a product-authorization process and tested for, among other properties, product stability at various temperatures and dilutions; stain and corrosion protection on a range of materials; and wetting, cleaning and physical properties.

Finally LS-P-388 was given to a chemist with expertise in safety, health and environmental regulations, who evaluated the chemicals used in the formula along with any possible chemical reactions that might occur between them.

Product Trials and Evaluation

To evaluate the new lubricant in a production environment, Orchid loaded the lube, at a 17:1 mix, into a recirculating roll coater feeding a laminating press. In short order, the toolroom became comfortable with the new lubricant, after noting how well it could handle and clean the dies. Employees also liked the fact that only a light residue remained on the dies.

Careful attention was paid to tool life, although measuring improvement here posed a challenge due to frequent tool changes and the stamping of different parts. In general, Orchid’s production and toolroom personnel felt that tool life had improved, even doubling on some dies. Also, when switching from stamping high-silica steel to cold-rolled on the same die, which had previously required adjustment of the die and the lube, they were able to avoid making any adjustments, minimizing downtime during changeover.

Along with increased tool life, Orchid also has been able to reduce the amount of lubricant applied to the stock. Before the switch in lubes, the pressroom used a float switch to sense lubricant level in the sump. A rising level during operation indicated a lube failure because all of the fluid in circulation was draining back to the tank. During testing with LS-P-388, Orchid employees noted that flow had reduced so much that the level of the tank never changed enough to trigger the float switch. The plant installed a new sensor in the return line to monitor lubricant flow back to the tank.

Also, employees noted that LS-P-388 burned off cleanly during annealing.