Manufacturing Technology

Over 500 fastener companies worldwide are producing on furnaces from AICHELIN Group, including mesh belt furnace and cast link belt furnace lines. All of which can be used by fastener manufacturers for a wide range of products – from micro fasteners for watches to large bolts and nuts.

As one of the oldest industrial furnace manufacturers, AICHELIN Group consists of more than 15 companies spread over almost every continent. The Group is divided into four major divisions: Industrial Furnace Solutions, Induction Technology, Global Services and most recently Heating Technology, which was introduced when the Group started manufacturing and offering electric heating systems.

“AICHELIN Group works closely with the fastener and fixing market,” explains Harald Berger, head of market communications at AICHELIN Group. “Whether it’s a world renowned fastener manufacturer or a customer who only orders a new plant every twenty years – it’s imperative we keep good relationships with everybody.”

AICHELIN’s last two orders showcase the wide range of its customers – recently supplying a US manufacturer with a quenching and tempering capacity of 2,500kg/hour, as well as providing a small family business in Europe – which last bought from the company 24 years ago – a mesh belt furnace with a capacity of 150kg/h.

Classic heat treatment systems for fasteners are mesh belt furnace lines or cast link belt furnace lines. They both consist of a loading device, pre-washing system, hardening furnace, quenching tank, post washing system, tempering furnace and unloading systems – together with endogas generators and surveillance and control software.

There is a wide range of different features and options of these different furnace types. This starts with different loading and unloading systems with exact dosing via the design of the furnace chamber with or without muffle; electrically or gas heated, quenching basins; and discharge systems for oils, emulsions and salt. In recent years, the options for higher energy efficiency have attracted increasing interest, be it the use of plant waste heat or particularly economical drive motors and higher quality insulation. Here too AICHELIN makes full use of its experience from many other industrial sectors.  

“Over the years, small, but important, improvements have set AICHELIN apart. This includes the new carousel quenching tank, as well as the heating with highly efficient and low polluting ETAMAT gas burners,” comments Harald.

“We are in close contact with our customers in order to find the right solution for their products. For instance if a muffle system has advantages for the customer or not. This depends on the amount of switching in the heat treatment processes per production day or on the process itself. For example, the carbonitriding processes with a CHD of 0.15mm – 0.3mm or even higher are preferably heat treated in muffle furnaces, especially if we have to switch to common hardening processes in between. Furnaces without muffle can be built bigger and increase the throughput in order to achieve more economic solutions. Very often customers already have a lot of experience and contact us with a preferred solution,” explains Harald.

AICHELIN is focused on heat treatment solutions but also offers products and services to support customers during the lifetime of its furnaces (in average more than 25 years) with technical support, updates and trainings, as well as heat treatment basics or safety issues. Additional software solutions for IoT can also be adopted to existing furnace lines. AICHELIN is also able to prepare equipment for a production shutdown as well as helping to plan updates and repairs during this period – something that has been extremely important over the last 12 months.

“During the Covid-19 pandemic we were confronted with the same problems as all industries across the world. In the fastener industry the furnaces normally run 24/7 – 12 months a year. We were therefore able to assist our customers with shutdowns where needed,” mentions Harald. “Besides Covid-19, the industries we are involved in also had other challenges. These include the reduction of CO2, production change to electrical vehicles, reduction of energy consumption and many others. At AICHELIN we are ready with new furnace and service concepts that provide the right answers to all these challenges and more.”

Harald adds: “Other challenges our customers are facing include the need for higher quality, which has become even more important, especially under CQI-9 regulations for the automotive industry. There are also more requests for digitalisation of the equipment. At AICHELIN we are able to supply reliable equipment with higher automatisation of the heat treatment lines, which also help reduce operating costs and uses energy saving technology to further reduce CO2 emissions.”

Looking forward, AICHELIN is optimistic about the Fastener Fair Stuttgart show in November. “Traditionally, machines and equipment have been a strong part of Fastener Fair Stuttgart, so we will be there ready to see our customers, as well as some new potential ones. People are hungry to meet personally again, having a coffee or a beer together with a Swabian Brezel and chat with partners and colleagues. We look forward to seeing you there,” concludes Harald.