AL Circle: What role does Almex play in the aluminium industry?

Ravi Tilak: We provide equipment and technology and complete solutions for making aerospace aluminium balloons. Our significant focus has been on aerospace aluminium, slabs, and billet casting. But it's not just related to casting. We provide furnace-to-finish solutions, including metallurgical process know-how and training for a plant to completely absorb the essentials of qualifying their product for aerospace applications. Now, that is far more difficult than other alloys. The aerospace alloys are far more complex, and the quality requirements are very stringent; a plant becomes qualified once it is entirely on board with AS9100 and aerospace major qualifications. So, we hold our customers' hands up to complete their qualifications. So, it's more than just... Selling the equipment. No, I'll tell you. Our customers come to us looking for equipment but stay with us to buy solutions. Ultimately, it's the solution that you need. Because the ultimate customer is so important. So, our selling focus has always been on our customer's customers. Because they must be involved in whatever our customers want.

AL Circle: In the automotive industry, are 2000 series and 7000 series aerospace alloys used? If so, what specific parts are made from these alloys?

Ravi Tilak: Interestingly, aerospace alloys are now being deployed to run on ground transportation structures.  

In several areas around the wheel—and I'm not fully authorised to disclose to you the exact application requirements and the alloy chemistries for a given location—they are deployed in bumpers, brake pads, brake shoes, wheel parts, chassis, anywhere you need higher strength to reduce gauge, anywhere you need superior formability, you know, and anywhere you have additional corrosion resistance. 

They have better surface qualities than, say, a 6000 series hour. Not necessarily surface qualities, but the ability to stop corrosion or its progress. Surface quality goes with the surface finish, smoothness, and other things. But corrosion is a totally different game. And that is very important. Based on metallurgical factors, fatigue strength is significant in automotive.

AL Circle: Could we delve into the topic of crashworthiness as well?

Ravi Tilak: The energy absorption ability also involves how the energy is progressively absorbed when a vehicle crashes until that shock is transferred to the driver's cabin, right? So, it is a natural fit if you can have a material that takes more deformation energy but will still flex, preferably given a flexing orientation.

 Yes, superior. So, high formability, strength, and strength-to-weight ratio are some elements that have kept these alloys flying in the air and high fatigue strength. The exact reasons are bringing them down in the ground transportation structures. In truck bodies, bus bodies, two-wheelers, four-wheelers, automobiles, railway wagons. You're going to see them everywhere. 

AL Circe: What strategies or technologies do you employ to determine and optimise the optimal process windows for melting, purifying, filtering, casting, and homogenising in industrial settings?

Ravi Tilak: We issue solutions for melting, purifying, filtering, casting, and homogenising, and we tell the plant where to open the process windows during this entire process so that they can effectively monitor their quality and productivity and gain hands-on knowledge about how the process is going on a day-to-day basis.

AL Circle: How do you ensure that your in-house systems integration output meets the stringent requirements of aerospace majors?

Ravi Tilak: Yeah, it is deployed in two ways. We write all our automation software. We have a complete, fully integrated in-house systems integration output. We have an extensive systems integration department within our company. We design all PLC work, PLC structures of our control panels, write all the software for PLC controls, as well as HMI, the man-machine interface controls, as well as deploy sensors throughout the process from melting furnace to homogenisation furnace, including molten metal purification, level control, filtration, casting, and so on. so that the entire integration and automation is rendered effortless and seamless. And that has enabled the plants where we have supplied equipment and technology to qualify with aerospace majors quickly.

AL Circle: Could you share any specific projects you're excited about?

Ravi Tilak: Yeah, we are doing a great one in Korea now. Northrop Grumman supports this to help them satisfy their offset obligations. We did one project in India with Hindalco, the owners of Novelis, called Hindalco Almex Aerospace Limited. That plant is called Hindalco Almex Aerospace Limited. At one time, we had 30% ownership. But now we have since divested. However, the key part is that it's the first plant to be qualified by Boeing. The first overseas plant with the cast house was in India. It helps the U.S. Government and Boeing satisfy their offset obligations by importing aluminium and aerospace products back into the U.S. We are doing a similar project in Korea.

We have also completed several aerospace projects in other parts of the world. In Germany, we have completed two, one in Poland, one in Romania, two in Russia, and eight in China, in addition to soft alloy projects. So, it's been a very interesting journey overall.

AL Circle: How has the evolution of your technology prompted the development of new equipment in response to various challenges encountered over time, contributing to your continued success?

Ravi Tilak: As I told you, we are constantly challenged to develop new technology. Our customers always come to us with a challenge they don't want, and I can give you some examples.

Please. We hold the world record in casting the largest diameter billet in hard alloys and the world record in casting the largest slab—a 42-inch-thick slab 96 inches wide. It's a humongous slab.

AL Circle: What were those items, and what purposes are they serving?

Ravi Tilak: Those are not used as rolling because no rolling mill or extrusion press can handle such a billet. The billet is used for ring forging, for ring rolling purposes, where you make large rings for rockets and engines, aerospace engines. Also, the slab is used as tooling material and forging applications. So, it is significantly milled out to create moulds for various industries.

AL Circle: If an ingot of specific dimensions is required, can you produce one to meet the specifications?

Ravi Tilak: This means not just making one in the sense of making the tooling for one but also developing a casting practice and giving it to all of us as a whole package. So, our third project was large-diameter hollow billets, which the oil industry needs. We have developed tooling and technology to cast up to one meter diameter external and half a metre diameter internal hollow billet, which is again a different thing.

AL Circle: In addition to encountering requests for various form sizes from customers, what other challenges have you faced?

Ravi Tilak: Alloy development challenges: We were given one challenge: to develop the strongest alloy in the world.

Today, that alloy is owned by Universal Alloy Corporation, a great company, and the alloy designation for that alloy is 7136. and we were involved in developing the chemistry and the casting practices for it.

AL Circle; Is it uncommon for an equipment company to engage in the development of alloy chemistries?

Ravi Tilak: Oh yeah, absolutely unusual. But that's where our strength is. We are not just equipment design engineers and fabricators but also metallurgists at heart. Our company's aluminium processing knowledge is phenomenally large, and I'm very proud. That is the bottom line of our success. It is the day-to-day operations and end product application, followed by tweaking the beginning product or the alloy to deliver the end product application, the process in between, and the equipment.

AL Circle: How did you land in the aluminium industry? Was it something you planned or expected to do?

Ravi Tilak: I have a bachelor's degree in metallurgical engineering from IIT Bombay, one of the prestigious institutes and a master's in metallurgical engineering. But for the first year, I worked in the steel industry. But I was awed by the size of the equipment I was working with. You know, you have a 150-foot-tall ceiling and a 50-tonne molten steel carrying crucible walking over your head day in and day out. And I needed something more down-to-earth. So, aluminium is relatively within reach of your arms.