Page 18 - MetalForming September 2013

Materials & Coatings
Heat-Resistant Wear Plate 5- to 160-mm Thick
Mold- and die-steel provider International Mold Steel
(IMS), Florence, KY, introduces SSAB’s
Toolox 33 and Toolox
44 heat-resistant
wear plate materi-
als, promising to
retain 80 percent of
original hardness at
500 C. The highly machinable quenched-and-tempered tool steels are recommend- ed for use in molds and parts subjected to extreme stress and heat.
Toolox 33 (30-35 Rc, 130-142-ksi tensile strength) is designed to have low resid- ual stresses and good machinability. Supplied in plate 3⁄4- to 51⁄8-in. thick, applica- tions include plastic and rubber molds, bending tools and machine components. Toolox 44 (41-47 Rc, 14 ft.-lb. minimum impact energy at 68 F) is designed to have high impact and low residual stresses, and therefore good dimensional stability. Supplied in plate 0.200- to 51⁄8-in. thick, applications include machine components, wear parts, molds, press forming, and die-cast and forging dies.
Visit the IMS website for expert advice on milling, drilling and tapping these two alloys.
International Mold Steel: 859/342-6000; www.moldsteel.com
Design Tool for Material Comparison in Automotive Applications
WorldAutoSteel, along with the Steel Market Development Institute (SMDI), a busi- ness unit of the American Iron and Steel Institute, Detroit, MI, has unveiled new soft- ware that enables vehicle designers to quickly and accurately evaluate material-selec- tion tradeoffs, including mass, cost and greenhouse-gas emissions, for automotive applications. Dubbed Design Advisor, the software, developed by Dr. Don Malen of the University of Michigan’s College of Engineering, assists automotive decisionmakers in evaluating and selecting the material that best fits the requirements of a given application.
Design Advisor helps an engineer understand how material decisions affect numer- ous criteria, including vehicle mass, cost, fuel economy and environmental impact. “Since these criteria are not easily combined as a single objective number,” says Dr. Malen, “the decisionmaker must be presented with potential effects on mass, cost and emissions so appropriate tradeoffs can be evaluated and selected. Design Advi- sor provides decisionmakers with the ability to evaluate various materials at a vehi- cle system level.”
Since material decisions often are made early in the vehicle design cycle, the soft- ware is configured to operate with only the information available in the vehicle plan- ning stage. The mathematical models used in Design Advisor draw from the research and findings of several projects supported by SMDI, the Auto/Steel Part- nership, WorldAutoSteel and United States Automotive Materials Partnership LLC. Along with a complete version of the Design Advisor software, decisionmakers can download a user guide and case-study examples demonstrating the software’s func- tionality and use.
Learn more by visiting www.worldautosteel.org/projects/design-advisor.
Manual Helps Engineers Incorporate New Advanced Steels
into Bumper Designs
To assist engineers and automakers in applying the most lightweight and cost-effective steel bumpers in pas- senger cars and light trucks, the Steel Market Development Institute’s (SMDI) Bumper Group has released the 5th edition of Steel Bumper Systems for Passenger Vehicles and Light Trucks. The manual offers an updated, in-depth report on steel
bumper systems,
including infor-
mation on mate-
rial properties,
manufacturing
and product
design.
“As bumper
systems contin-
ue their evolu-
tion, automakers require current material, process and manufacturing information to develop the lightweight and affordable solutions required to be successful in today’s automotive marketplace,” says Ron Krupitzer, vice president, automotive market at SMDI.
The updated manual was designed as a resource to help automakers stay cur- rent with the latest automotive industry bumper developments, including struc- tural requirements and test standards. It provides updated 2012 market infor- mation on bumper system types, mate- rials and manufacturing processes and includes recent benchmarking informa- tion for vehicles up to the 2013 model year.
Originally published in 1998, the cur- rent 186-page manual features sections on bumper systems and components, steel materials, manufacturing process- es, manufacturing considerations, design concepts and relevant safety standards in North America and Europe. To down- load the Steel Bumper Systems for Pas- senger Vehicles and Light Trucks manual, visit www.autosteel.org.
16 MetalForming/September 2013
www.metalformingmagazine.com