Embarking on the journey of a new year, MTI reflects on the events and achievements that shaped our 2023. Amidst global challenges and unique opportunities, our commitment of excellence to you in operations and industry innovation took center stage.
Let’s delve into the highlights that defined a year of resilience for MTI.
Industry 4.0 for Friction Welding
In June, we were excited to introduce a new service offering to our customers: the MTInterface™ system SLA (Service Level Agreement).
The MTInterface system is a condition monitoring and machine performance solution, providing machine-level data and insights that lead to actionable improvements in machine up-time and productivity. You can read more about the MTInterface system here.
Forging Beyond the Stars
Perhaps the most stellar event of 2023 was a visit from NASA and Aerojet Rocketdyne, an L3 Harris Technologies Company, as well as South Bend’s Mayor, James Mueller.
Pictured are members from NASA and L3 Harris as well as South Bend’s Mayor and MTI’s employees.
MTI was delighted to host guests from NASA and L3 Harris as they thanked MTI for our continued support in the Artemis space program. Members from both NASA and L3 Harris were given a tour of MTI’s manufacturing facility to see where the specialized work of friction welding components used in the Powerhead Main Injectors of RS-25 engines happens! To learn more about our work with NASA, you can find our press release here.
Back in Earth’s atmosphere, MTI built and delivered an Inertia friction welder, model 750B, to an aerospace company. Once installed, this machine will produce aerospace components ranging from discs to discs, discs to shafts, multi-stage assemblies, and shaft to shaft geometries. You can explore more of our aerospace machines here.
Reconnecting
In September, Tom Budd, MTI’s Solutions Manager-Friction Welding, attended the 2023 Oil Sands Conference and Tradeshow to represent the work that friction welding is doing within the mining industry. Colleagues, customers, and new faces were able to connect with us for meaningful conversations. Are you ready to make a connection? Contact us!
While we continue to connect with customers face-to-face during events, we also offer opportunities for virtual engagement during times when travel may not be feasible.
MTI’s Simon Jones, Director of Aerospace, was a speaker at the first annual Friction Welding Symposium that took place in Germany last March. The Friction Welding Symposium is focused on delivering reports, innovative solutions, and process developments of friction welding processes in the industry. Due to travel restrictions, Jones was not able to join in-person, but was still afforded the opportunity to present MTI’s unique solutions online!
The last webinar that MTI hosted took place in 2021… and there have been numerous advancements to share with our customers since then. So to close out 2023, MTI held a live webinar to demonstrate the latest developments and advantages of Low Force friction welding, our newest friction welding technology. Attendees were able to participate in asking questions, watching demonstration videos, and even got a sneak peek at a new program offering! If you missed the webinar and would like to watch the on-demand upload, please email marketing@mtiwelding.com .
Forging Milestones
We had an exciting milestone coming out of our UK facility in 2023 – our 13th Low Force friction welding machine was built and has been shipped!
To date, MTI has built and delivered 12 Low Force machines that are operating in industry today welding dual-wall Steel pistons. These particular machines are vertically designed and fully robotic. For our customer, Low Force was able to deliver a part design with reduced compression heights and improved cooling galleries and oil flow, key to improving their manufacturing process and part design.
You can read more about the process in our case study. Watch Low Force in action:
Giving Thanks & Celebrating Together
We always like to end our year in review by thanking our MTI-family of employees who not only work diligently to keep MTI as the global leader in friction welding, but also for giving back to our local community. For the seventh year in a row, MTI participated in a Thanksgiving food drive with St. Vincent DePaul Society to feed our community. Thanks to the generosity of our employees, we were able to feed 20 families this Thanksgiving!
And as 2023 came to a close, the MTI-family celebrated the Holidays with our annual Choup-Off (chili and soup cook off) and trivia contest! While we crowned the top three winners for best chili, soup, and trivia teams, we can confidently say that everyone who participated in the contests won a great time with colleagues!
Pictured are the 2023 winners of our annual Choup-Off.
About MTI
MTI has established itself as a leader in Friction and Resistance Welding, including Rotary, Linear, Friction Stir and Low Force Friction Welding technologies. In addition to contract Manufacturing Services based in the US and UK, MTI has delivered machines to Boeing, GE, Dana, Pratt and Whitney, Federal Mogul, and many of their tier one suppliers. A family-owned business founded in 1926, MTI employs over 200 people across the globe.
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