NanoSteel, a provider of proprietary nano-structured steel material designs, has developed new, advanced high-strength steels (AHSS) with superior ductility and strength for use in automotive structures.
NanoSteel has created three types of steel that demonstrate a measured strength/elongation performance of 1600 MPa/15%, 1200 MPa/30%, and 950 MPa/35%, respectively. The company’s advancement provides automakers more options to utilize steel for the development of lightweight vehicles with high fuel efficiency, while allowing them to maintain safety. It also enables the automotive industry to continue to leverage steel’s scale, efficiency and infrastructure instead of shifting to other lightweight materials, which may have longer cycle times, higher costs and limited availability.
NanoSteel’s Founder and Chief Technology Officer, Daniel Branagan stated that these paradigm changes in performance levels are made possible by new innovations associated with the creation of nano-scale microstructures or nano-structures. Earlier, nano-structure-made sheet steel was believed to be too brittle to fabricate the shapes needed for automotive components. On the other hand, the company’s materials are based on latest mechanisms that create nano-structures during production, thus eliminating the cause of brittleness.
The new AHSS materials use traditional steel processes and evade the utilization of exotic alloying elements. Hitherto, a major issue with existing AHSS materials is the requirement to create components at high temperatures, which in turn increase production cycle times and costs. This extra processing is eliminated thanks to the intrinsic ductility of NanoSteel’s materials that enables the formation of components utilizing temperature metal stamping processes on available production equipment such as cold forming.
NanoSteel’s President and Chief Executive Officer, David Paratore stated that the company’s patented discovery offers another benefit for automotive OEMs to ‘Stick With Steel’ as the ideal material for use in automotive structures and aftermarket servicing.
Source: http://www.nanosteelco.com/