📋 Case Study
Aerospace Forging Facility: Closed-Loop Heat Treatment ROI
Material rejection rate of 9.2% due to inconsistent microstructure; NADCAP non-conformance trending upward
🏗️ Project Overview
Installation of AI-controlled atmosphere furnaces with real-time thermocouple mapping and adaptive soak algorithms
🎯 Challenge
Material rejection rate of 9.2% due to inconsistent microstructure; NADCAP non-conformance trending upward
🔧 Design Approach
Closed-loop thermal control with digital twin validation, automated lot traceability, and SPC integration
📐 Design Diagram
AI-generated project design illustration
📐 Key Calculations
Scrap Reduction ROI
9.2% → 2.1% scrap × $4,200 avg. forging value × 12,500 parts/yr
Result: $374,000/yr
Direct yield improvement
NADCAP Audit Cost Avoidance
Avg. corrective action cost per finding × 5 findings/audit × 2 audits/yr
Result: $89,000/yr
Compliance risk mitigation
📊 Results
NPV @ 6% over 7 years: $2.81M; IRR: 28.4%; Microstructure Cpk improved from 0.92 to 1.87💡 Lessons Learned
- •Digital twin validation shortened commissioning by 3 weeks
- •Thermocouple redundancy prevented 3 potential batch rejections
- •SPC integration enabled real-time process drift detection
✅ Key Takeaways
- 1Digital twin validation shortened commissioning by 3 weeks
- 2Thermocouple redundancy prevented 3 potential batch rejections
- 3SPC integration enabled real-time process drift detection
📐 Prerequisites
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➡️ Next Step
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🔗 Engineering Applications
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