Aluminium Industry

Aluminium Process Technologies

Aluminium is the only material that offers a unique combination of properties not to be found in other materials. It has played a key role, particularly in the aerospace and automotive industries, owing to its low density, high strength yet excellent formability, good corrosion resistance and weldability. In addition to a long list of very attractive characteristics which are responsible for the popularity aluminium has enjoyed as a structural material in various applications, its non-toxicity and recyclability have made aluminium the number one packaging material for food and beverages of all kinds.

These very attractive characteristics of aluminium are fully exploited in Turkey in a number of growing markets ranging from the building and transportation to flexible packaging industries. However, in spite of a steadily increasing demand in the past several years, Turkey's per-capita aluminium consumption is still far below that of the industrialized countries and is therefore expected to increase substantially over the next five to ten years. It is thus fair to conclude that aluminium is going to be demanded, produced and traded more and more in Turkey in the near future. Research on various aspects of the aluminium metallurgy thus constitutes one of the major activities OF THE Aluminum Processing Group.

Aluminium Processing Group is engaged in a number of activities all of which are performed within the framework of contract-base research projects:

R&D for the processing of aluminum sheet, foil and extrusion profiles.
Optimization of rafination practices for aluminum foundries.
Characterization of fluxes, grain refiners and master alloys and other consumables for aluminum foundries.
Process development for the manufacture of cast composites.
R&D and consulting for the recycling of aluminum scrap.
Rapid solidification processing of aluminum alloys.

Aluminum Processing Group has undertaken over the past several years, 6 process R&D projects for ASSAN Aluminium, the leading aluminium company who employs the latest of the strip casting technology to produce a range of aluminium sheet and foil products. These projects were undertaken to develop down stream processing cycles for thin-gauge, high-speed cast aluminum strips. They were completed to the satisfaction of our client and a 2-year contract for a new project which will last until the end of 2004 was recently signed with ASSAN. The group has recently completed a contract-research project for SARAY Aluminium, which was undertaken to improve the extrusion process with a special emphasis on the profile quality and is thus able to offer R&D services to the extrusion plants.

In addition to these projects, we have devoted our efforts in the past several years, within the framework of a EUREKA project (E!1824 FINSTOCK) and in close cooperation with ASSAN and FRITERM, to the development of aluminium finstock with improved formability and quality to meet the ever increasing demands of the fin producers. The Research Institute for Metals and HZB of Czech Republic have also participated in this research program. ASSAN has become the major supplier of finstock in the domestic market following the successful completion of this program. We've developed a great deal of expertise in the field of secondary aluminium processing in the course of these projects.

The group is engaged in R&D activities within the framework of an another Eureka Project (E!2530 CONTCASTALTRANS) towards the implementation of the Twin-Roll Casting Technology for the manufacture of aluminum sheet for structural automotive applications.