Forge Design Engineering
Anchor Harvey customers understand that we bring high-quality, pristine, and exactly designed forged aluminum products to every job. As a premier manufacturer, customers can expect Anchor Harvey to produce whatever is necessary for any application, in any environment, and for any use case. However, you may ask, how does Anchor Harvey do this? How can a customer get the exact shape they need even if we’ve never made this specific part before? How does Anchor Harvey ensure that each part is exact, precise, and consistent from beginning to end?
The answer is through preparation and proper forge engineering.
The Benefits of Forge Engineering
Designing and engineering a proper forged part may seem simple at a glance, and indeed it can be. However, by getting deep into design procedures and engineering decisions from the beginning, the forge engineering team can make the process faster, improve the final product, and provide consistent feedback to customers throughout the entire process.
Here are listed some of the many benefits that the proper forging engineering and design at Anchor Harvey can provide:
- Design Optimization: Customers understand what they need but may not know how to get what they want. Our forge engineering team can advise customers on what will provide the best result for a specific use case. Engineers can also advise customers about possible faults or difficult design features that may cause unintended problems in the finished piece.
- Customized Alloys: Anchor Harvey’s forge design engineers can provide customers with a detailed exploration of the various alloys available and what modifications can be made to provide the needed material properties. Customers will also be advised on any changes that Anchor Harvey engineers believe are necessary for intended uses.
- Process Elimination: Custom forge engineering that keeps the end of the process in mind can eliminate unnecessary procedures and processes to achieve a given end-state. Perhaps a customer requests a certain heat treatment that isn’t strictly necessary; the custom engineering process provided by Anchor Harvey forge engineers can identify this unnecessary procedure and omit it. In addition, a custom forged part with complex shaping can also combine what would otherwise be multiple welded parts. By designing the dies to more rigorous specifications, Anchor Harvey can eliminate some welding and machining procedures.
- Final Shaping: Having a custom die-forged part made from a custom tooled die can mean a consolidation of post-forge processes. Forged parts requiring very precise shapes may require machining to be done, but with a final shape in mind and the custom engineering solutions from Anchor Harvey, many parts will require less machining than a similar part from other manufacturers (and may eliminate this process entirely).
- Material Waste: By optimizing the production process, we can greatly reduce the prevalence of scrap and material waste. Less post-forging processes, tighter tolerances, a custom-designed die, and constant feedback to the customer leads to less waste. Less material waste means that Anchor Harvey can optimize its material purchases and pass those savings onto the customer.
- Lead Times: All of the previous benefits contribute to an overall shorter lead time. By taking the time at the beginning of the process to fully design and customize parts and production tooling, Anchor Harvey can save customers time at the end of the production run.
- Final Cost: Finally, the customer can realize a lower cost per part and lower overall final cost. Custom engineering from the Anchor Harvey team means fewer material purchases, faster turnarounds, more reliable parts, and better part performance. Customers know what they will receive and are kept updated at every step of the process.
Forge Engineering from Anchor Harvey
Anchor Harvey pushes the boundaries of our customer’s product innovation and design to bring a higher-quality product to the forged aluminum market. By being involved in our customer’s early-stage design, the engineers at Anchor Harvey can make recommendations to optimize the forged product, regardless of complexity, to provide a superior product.
Anchor Harvey has the capabilities to engineer tooling for our customer’s parts off of anything from a full 3D model to a rough napkin sketch, all in the service of providing the best customer designed forged aluminum parts to all industries. Request a quote today.