Where will heat treatment be in five years' time?

Kevin explains: "There was a slowdown in innovation in heat treatment processing during the last recession as volumes dropped and the focus shifted to immediate costs and cashflow, but in recent years with new model introductions, the industry is increasingly looking to the future."

Here, Eurotherm offers its predictions for heat treatment over the next five years:

1. India, China and Singapore will continue to grow; the quality of their parts will be a key driver for greater penetration of heat-treated, high-value engineering products
2. There will be a slow drift of aerospace manufacturing away from the traditional strongholds such as the USA and UK
3. Globally the de-skilling process in manufacturing will continue, with companies relying more and more on automation and "expert' systems for process control
4. Usage of new materials that do not require heat treatment and low distortion processes will continue to grow
5. Smaller, lighter components will lead to smaller batch sizes and an increased requirement for smaller, energy efficient furnaces and controls
6. An increase in the use of energy efficient heating and furnace technologies combined with improved control systems

Invensys Eurotherm provides furnace control systems that enable customers to optimise the heat treatment furnace control process. This reduces waste through increased accuracy of furnace control and specialist control algorithms, optimising energy and power usage and curtailing rework and reducing scrap by improving consistency and repeatability. The company's top performing products in heat treatment include: 6000 series recording products, 3000 series controller programmers and nanodac. Go to www.eurotherm.co.uk for further information.