Ease of Manufacturing Can Impact Material Selection of Pumps
Demand for highly engineered materials in process industries follows from the need for reliable equipment and accessories, for optimum service life with seldom-interrupted operations.
Product development today benefits from computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided engineering (CAE) and product-lifecycle management (PLM) disciplines, allowing a level of automation, analysis and documentation never before possible.
Nevertheless, failure to understand the crucial role of proper metallurgical controls from design through manufacture can lead to increased failure rates and production loss. Material selection and processing are critical — for new product development and for redesign upgrades for service or reliability improvement.
Material selection from numerous options requires careful evaluation of their properties for suitability. Factors such as economy, service compatibility, manufacturability, mechanical properties, corrosion — wear resistance and availability are to be considered prior to specifying the material for a given application. If selection is carried out haphazardly, the best material options may be ignored. Risk can be reduced by adopting a systematic material-selection procedure through verification testing.
In a broad sense, material selection is optimized by communication feedback between the field and manufacturer on performance, considering investment and operations and maintenance costs, to minimize total cost while ensuring acceptable safety and reliability.
Read full article at: Processing Magazine
