Benchmarking Melting
Two metalcasters share insight into investments and organization for more capacity, improved melt quality and better work flow. SHANNON WETZEL, SENIOR EDITOR
W
hether your metalcasting facility is melting copper,
aluminum, iron or steel, a few key considerations are common to achieving an efficient and quality-
driven melt department. • Melt and material control. • Good furnace practices, including maintenance repair.
• Energy efficiency. • Optimum work flow.
In this article, an aluminum shop 18 | MODERN CASTING April 2012
and an iron casting facility share how equipment purchases and good plan- ning were key to increasing the capacity of their melt department with logistics, efficiency and quality in mind.
AFW’s Melt Department Overhaul
AFW Foundry, Lannon, Wisconsin, needed more melt capacity to meet the demand of its green sand and nobake molding lines. At first, it considered adding more melting furnaces, but fur- ther study of melting time per furnace indicated the metalcaster wasn’t fully utilizing its current equipment.
“As we studied how much time we spent melting during the day, we dis- covered it was much smaller than we thought,” said Brian Gerstmeier, AFW operations manager. Like many job shop facilities,
AFW’s growth over the years resulted in a shop floor with melting equip- ment scattered around to serve new or expanded molding lines. Eventually, the facility had three separate melt areas serving its squeezer mold lines, automatic molding line and nobake molding line. In 2010, it centralized all melting operations into one area.
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