Case Study Multiple Casting Processes Improve Quality for Defense Applications

Overview

A manufacturer of non-ferrous pumps and valves for naval defense applications faced persistent quality issues affecting critical components. Because equipment installed on submarines and surface ships cannot fail, the customer required a supplier capable of meeting the stringent quality standards demanded by naval programs.

Challenge

The customer previously sourced all metal castings from a select number of U.S. sand casting foundries. However, recurring quality issues resulted in customer inspection failure rates of up to 80% and critical delivery delays to U.S. shipyards. The customer sought a new supplier capable of improving both quality and on-time delivery performance.

Solution

Rather than simply replacing one sand casting supplier with another, MetalTek reviewed each component with the customer to determine the most appropriate casting process. Select parts were converted from sand castings to centrifugal and investment castings to address quality issues, while sand castings were retained where they remained effective.

MetalTek’s diverse range of metal casting processes enabled the customer to move beyond a single-process supplier and consolidate work with a vertically integrated manufacturer that offers in-house machining and comprehensive quality services, including X-ray inspection. In addition, MetalTek successfully supplied the required copper-nickel alloy across its Wisconsin Centrifugal, Wisconsin Investcast, and Carondelet Divisions.

Result

MetalTek now manufactures dozens of unique part numbers for the customer across multiple casting processes. Converting select components to centrifugal and investment castings at Wisconsin Centrifugal and Wisconsin Investcast eliminated recurring defects, while Carondelet’s sand castings delivered higher quality than those from the previous suppliers. As a result, the customer achieved significantly improved first-pass quality and on-time delivery for critical naval applications.

Contact MetalTek to discuss how our diverse metal casting processes can support your most demanding applications.