Testing their metal

During my time in college, there was plenty of Bob Marley, Jack Johnson, and Ben Harper in rotation on my iPod; however, at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) and The University of Tennessee Knoxville (UT), they’re focusing on heavy metal.

Submarines, tanks, fighter jets, and many more things used by the military require tons of metal, which isn’t the easiest material to find currently in the United States. Luckily, Virginia Tech and UT received funding from the Army and Navy respectively to develop new manufacturing approaches.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center and the Office of Naval Research awarded UT and colleagues at Mississippi State University $5 million to research new steel materials, welding and strengthening mechanisms, and wire-arc additive manufacturing (WAAM).

“This project is exciting not only because we are creating next-generation materials for the Navy, but because metallurgy is often seen as a mature technology that’s overlooked when people think about manufacturing innovation,” Eric Lass, assistant professor of materials science in UT’s Tickle College of Engineering says. “But the work we do in additive manufacturing can help our country advance in manufacturing.”

Meanwhile at Virginia Tech, Hang Yu, associate professor of materials science and engineering, is leading research with the U.S. Army Research Laboratory on faster, economical, and more effective approaches to casting and forging in metal manufacturing.

Yu’s research focuses on additive friction stir deposition (AFSD) which uses friction to reshape high-strength metals such as aluminum, steel, and titanium.

AFSD leaves the metal less prone to cracking and porosity while purifying and improving its properties by changing its underlying microstructure, making AFSD a good candidate for upcycling low-quality scrap metal, according to Yu.

While we’ve covered additive manufacturing (AM) used to create components in defense and firearms manufacturing, using AM in the actual production and recycling of metal is a first for me.

The UT research will be done over a three-year period while Virginia Tech’s research is part of a five-year project, so we’ll keep track of any new developments, especially since the metal supply chain in America is so tense currently.