MagShapes Magnesium Extrusion & Sheet Technology
designed to narrow the competitive gap between aluminum & magnesium extrusions, plate & sheet
Wrought Alloy Casting Technology Comparison
Benchmark Al DC Casting
- Hot Top Multi-strand Mold
- Billet end loss is ~3%
- No billet surface scalping required
MagShapes Mg Casting
- Commercial Casting Technology adapted to specific needs of magnesium casting
- End losses ~1%
- No surface scalping required
- Produces magnesium Feed Stock for Extrusion and Plate & Sheet Rolling
Mg DC Casting
Mg DC Casting
- Magnesium Hot Top DC Casting is difficult;
- Magnesium industry uses an Open Top Single Strand Mold
- Billet end loss is ~3-7% depending on billet length
- Rough as-cast billet surface results in ~11.5 % scalping loss
Extrusion Technology Comparison
MagShapes multi-strand Extrusion Technology
increases magnesium extrusion speed, yield & productivity compared to a conventional magnesium Extrusion Press.
When combined with MagShapes Casting Technology,
magnesium extrusions become highly cost competitive with aluminum extrusions on a "Cost per Part" basis
Comparison -Aluminum, MagShapes & Conventional Magnesium
Mg Extrusion Feed Stock Casting comparison with Mg DC Billet & Benchmark Al DC Billet
MagShapes Casting Technology provides a step change improvement over Mg DC Casting in both Performance & Safety and closes the competitive gap with Al DC Casting
Mg Finished Extrusion comparison with Conventional Mg Extrusion & Benchmark Al Process
Using Feed Stock (as per previous table),
MagShapes Extrusion Technology provides a significant improvement over Mg Press Extrusion
in both Performance & Cost
and
is Cost Competitive with Al Extrusion
on a "per kg" & a "Finished Part" basis
Status Update & Next Steps
The MagShapes Casting process uses industrially proven metal casting technology - to date, a limited number of Magnesium casting trials have been successfully conducted.
The MagShapes Extrusion technology also employs commercially proven equipment adapted to the requirements needed to extrude magnesium at high speed. The extrusion technology has been extensively tested on magnesium on both a pilot & on a full scale machine. Testing has successfully demonstrated capability to extrude several different extruded magnesium profiles with high yield, surface finish & internal quality. Magnesium extrusion speeds are at least 4 times faster than with conventional extrusion methods. In a commercial product evaluation, a pallet load of a particularly difficult magnesium extruded part was made with the MagShapes process at a 93% yield. By comparison, conventional magnesium Press extrusion yield for this part is only 70% because of the need to cut out internal extrusion defects associated with the press process. The MagShapes & conventional extruded sections were used in a blind test by the customer without any problems or complaints.
Tech Magnesium is now seeking strategic partner(s) to support the setup & operation of a MagShapes pilot casting & extrusion line for commercial demonstration.
