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Application Spotlight: Light-duty ring in an air vent nozzle

Explore how a light-duty Spirolox^® retaining ring is used in an airplane air vent nozzle to regulate airflow. This application spotlight shows how the ring fits into a groove in the plastic housing, securing the nozzle during rotation. Designed for light loads and axial positioning, it offers a simple, economical solution that is easy to install and remove.
View this informative Smalley video.

Fasteners for automotive and agricultural equipment

Norm Fasteners has acquired an automotive fastener manufacturing plant in Plymouth, MI, expanding its North American footprint beyond sales, engineering, and logistics. The local facility produces metric fasteners (M4-M24) and engine bolts. Norm’s portfolio includes wheel bolts, studs, custom fasteners, and licensed MAThread^® and TAPTITE^® products, serving diverse automotive and industrial assembly needs.
Learn more or contact Belgin Tunce for more information.

3M Cooling Film for vehicle roofs launched

New 3M Cooling Film is a roof-applied heat-management solution designed to help keep vehicle cabins cooler, reduce cooling demand, and improve operational efficiency. The aftermarket product uses advanced thermal management technology to reflect more than 85% of solar radiation. Interior vehicle temperatures can be reduced by up to 10 degrees F with this product. Installs like graphics by professional installers using 3M adhesive technologies. Initially designed for fleet and rail operators.
Learn more.

Test your knowledge: High-temp adhesives

Put your knowledge to the test by trying to answer these key questions on how to choose the right high-temperature-resistant adhesive. The technical experts from Master Bond cover critical information necessary for the selection process, including questions on glass transition temperature and service temperature range. Some of the answers may surprise even the savviest of engineers.
Take the quiz.

New Air Holster Safety Air Gun Mount

EXAIR's new Model 5930 Air Holster provides a simple and convenient way to keep Safety Air Guns secure and within easy reach at workstations throughout a facility. Designed to give operators a designated location for their air gun when not in use, the Air Holster helps prevent misplaced tools while keeping work areas organized and efficient. Its practical design makes it an ideal addition to manufacturing, assembly, maintenance, and other industrial workstations where Safety Air Guns are frequently used.
Learn more.

Southco access hardware in rail applications

Discover how Southco's rail access hardware solutions help improve safety, reliability, and operational efficiency across modern rail networks. The video showcases a range of rail applications where Southco's access hardware plays a critical role, including driver cabins, lighting systems, tray tables, headrests, armrests, and other passenger and operator touchpoints. Designed to support dependable performance in demanding moving environments, Southco's solutions help operators streamline maintenance processes, minimize downtime, and enable more proactive asset management.
View the video.

Multi-zone tension leveler for hard-to-flatten alloys

Redex USA's Levelflex^® is a modular, multi-zone tension leveler engineered for continuous processing lines, including coating and heat treatment of aluminum alloys and where flatness is critical to coating adhesion and downstream formability. By stretching material within 95% of its yield strength, it corrects stubborn flatness defects in fewer passes. It comes in open-loop pure stretch or closed-loop tension measurement modes to optimize surface integrity and eliminate crossbow.
Learn more.

Hold any shape with ID and OD Form Holding Clamps

These simple OD and ID clamping solutions from Fixtureworks clamp onto your part in one easy operation, eliminating the need for custom fixtures. They allow users to clamp onto the inner or outer diameter of small-size, irregularly shaped work parts fast. Lots of options.
Learn more.

Need inserts? We make it E-Z.

Founded in 1956, E-Z LOK allows users to repair damaged or worn-out threads without the need for special taps or installation tools. Our line of threaded locking inserts is used in metal, plastic, wood, composite, and additive industries. Extensive inventories are maintained in four warehouses across the U.S., and all products are sold through industrial distributors. One source for all your needs!
Learn more
or contact Kyle Lindsly-Roach for free samples at 310.323.5613 x221.

Stop paying the 'assembly tax': Why your next design should be one part not 10

"As metal additive manufacturing (AM) moves from the prototyping lab to mainline production, the most significant ROI isn't found in making parts faster, it's found in making fewer of them." So says Erica Manzella of Go Engineer. Learn about the hidden costs of traditional assembly, the DfAM toolset native to SOLIDWORKS, and the advanced 3DEXPERIENCE optimization tools and industrial metal AM hardware that are making monolithic design a physical reality.
Read the GoEngineer blog.

Best-seller: Copper filament for 3D printing

Virtual Foundry, the company that brought us 3D-printable lunar regolith simulant, says Copper Filamet™ (not a typo) is its best-selling metal filament. This material is compatible with any open-architecture FDM/FFF 3D printer. After sintering, final parts are 100% pure copper. The company says this is one of the easiest materials to print and sinter. Stainless steel, porcelain, aluminum, and titanium available too.
Learn more and get all the specs.

What can replace a coil spring? You've got better options!

Traditional coil springs can limit mechanical designs. Wave springs offer a space-saving alternative, providing equivalent force and deflection in up to half the operating height while reducing assembly size and weight. There are four wave spring types that can replace a coil spring. Learn how each variant delivers unique performance capabilities to optimize space, efficiency, and reliability.
Read this informative NEW Smalley technical article.

Next-gen metal bonding: 3M Scotch-Weld 8500 Series

Replace traditional fasteners and streamline assembly with 3M Scotch-Weld Acrylic Adhesive DP8507NS. Engineered for direct bonding to bare or slightly oily metals with minimal surface prep, this high-performance adhesive withstands paint bake cycles up to 200 C (392 F), resists corrosion, and holds strong down to -40 C. Upgrade durability, aesthetics, and design flexibility. Bonds many plastics too!
View the video.

3 things you need to get right when 3D printing gears

When businesses decide to 3D print their own gears, they can reduce lead times and costs associated with replacements, prototypes, and small-batch production runs significantly. According to the experts at igus, however, "achieving industrial-grade reliability requires more than just a digital file; there are several fundamental technical basics you must master first to ensure your gears can withstand the rigors of real-world use."
Read this informative igus tech tip.

DURACON polymer with 30% recycled content

Daicel Corporation's High Performance Polymers SBU has launched four new DURACON^® POM grades featuring 30% post-consumer recycled (PCR) content. Unveiled at CHINAPLAS 2026, the lineup includes Standard, Low VOC, Sliding, and Tough options. Leveraging advanced compounding expertise, Daicel maintains quality and mechanical performance comparable to standard virgin resin grades for demanding global industrial and automotive components.
Learn more.

Kobe Steel admits falsifying data on products, 500 companies affected

By Mike Foley, Designfax

In a series of three press releases rolled out beginning Oct. 8, Japan's third-largest steelmaker, Kobe Steel Ltd., has admitted to "improper conduct" where "data in inspection certificates had been improperly rewritten etc., and the products were shipped as having met the specifications concerned." With group member companies in Japan, the Americas, Asia, and Europe, the company is also a major supplier of aluminum and copper products in many world markets.

In short, some materials the company produced over the past 10 years may not have been up to snuff in terms of strength and/or durability. Some inspection reports were falsified.

The problem is estimated to affect a ballooning number of companies -- 500 is the latest figure.

According to an Oct. 15 Reuters article, "The revelations over the past week rippled through supply chains across the world as companies from operators of Japan's famous bullet trains to the world's biggest aircraft maker, Boeing Co., were ensnared in the scandal. ... No safety problems have surfaced as the Japanese steelmaker attempts to get a grip on the data tampering that it earlier said may go back as far as ten years."

An Oct. 13 Bloomberg article provides more details: "Initially, the company confessed to falsifying data about the strength and durability of some copper and aluminum that was used in cars and trains and possibly planes and a space rocket, too. Then Kobe Steel said it also faked data about iron ore powder and materials used in DVDs and LCD screens. ... A day later it flagged misconduct related to more items including steel wire and copper piping, some of which were produced overseas."

"The fabrication of data relating to aluminum was found at all four of Kobe Steel's local plants in conduct the company described as 'systematic,'" the Bloomberg article states. The article lists Toyota Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co., Subaru Corp., Hitachi (trains), and Ford among the many companies affected. The article also says: "The company has said it'll release the findings of safety checks for the products in about two weeks, and the causes of the issue and planned countermeasures within a month."

An Oct. 14 RT article stated that at least one Japanese nuclear power plant could also have been affected.

Some examples of misconduct, as admitted directly by Kobe Steel (these are straight from the company releases), include:

• A portion of the inspections (dimensions, etc.), which Kobe Steel had agreed with customers, was not conducted.
• Rewriting of inspection data prescribed in the specification sheet, which Kobe Steel had agreed with customers.
• Tensile testing, which Kobe Steel had agreed with customers, was not conducted, and instead a hardness test was substituted. Instead, tensile testing was shortened, and an estimated calculation was entered as tensile strength based on the results of the hardness test.
• Unmeasured microalloyed chemical values were entered, and a portion of the tensile properties, which were target values for reference, was used.
• Rewriting of inspection data of prescribed specifications (dimensions, etc.), which Kobe Steel had agreed with customers.

The products include:

• Aluminum flat-rolled products, aluminum extrusions, copper strips, copper tubes, and aluminum castings and forgings in shipping period Sept. 1, 2016 to Aug. 31, 2017;
• Steel powder for powder metallurgy (sintering) shipped in fiscal 2016;
• Sputtering target materials shipped from Nov. 2011 onward;
• Copper alloy tubes and molds, copper tubes (capillary tubes), aluminum alloy wires and aluminum alloy bars, and copper wires shipped Sept. 2016 to Aug. 2017; and
• Some steel wires and special steel shipped as far back as June 2011.

An Oct. 12 BBC article says the company is well aware of the serious and grim nature of the disclosure of its practices. "The credibility of Kobe Steel has plunged to zero," said Kobe's president, Hiroya Kawasaki, in the piece. This article also says that Toyota, Mazda, and General Motors are among the firms affected.

The Japan Times reported this morning (Oct. 17) that the U.S. Department of Justice has "demanded that Kobe Steel Ltd. provide information related to its faked product data scandal."

Latest: "Japanese Carmakers Call Kobe Steel's Products Safe Despite Scandal," NY Times, Oct. 19, 2017.

Kobe Steel has posted the following statement on its website homepage:

We are extremely sorry for our improper conduct

The Kobe Steel Group, together with its suppliers, is quickly working to determine how its products have affected safety and other factors. We are thoroughly analyzing the cause and are engaged in developing countermeasures to prevent a reoccurrence from happening. We are making sincere efforts to eliminate the burden on all parties concerned and to resolve these problems as quickly as possible.

We suggest you Google "Kobe Steel" and select "news" to keep up with the latest. This story will be rolling out more details for a very long time.

You can view the original Kobe Steel press releases here.

Published October 2017

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