“The future cannot be predicted, but futures can be invented.” — Denis Gabor, Nobelist and author of Inventing the Future (1963) Editor’s Note: In the first of some 22 US patents granted to Charles Martin Hall for his invention of the aluminum electrolysis process, he basically claimed an inert anode “formed of copper, platinum, or […]
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Editors Note: Aluminum and its alloys are passed through hot and cold rolling mills throughout the world to make thinner and longer products in the direction of rolling for a variety of applications in a range of lengths, thicknesses, and widths. In the rolling process, the aluminum slab may end up as either a hot […]
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Editor’s Note: Constantly changing, constantly innovating, the transportation industry relies on aluminum and every other materials group in manufacturing their products, which today move us speedily across land, sea, air, and even into space itself. All told, in 2021, transportation represented the biggest global aluminum market share with some 32% of all primary or secondary […]
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US11400498 — CROSS ROLLING MILL — SMS Group GmbH (Germany) — A cross-rolling mill, comprising: a plurality of roll shafts (1), each having a rotary bearing and applying a radially directed rolling force to a workpiece, wherein an orientation of a roll axis (w) of at least one of the roll shafts (1) is adjustable […]
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Editor’s Note: With ET ’22 happening (May 3-5, 2022), it was appropriate to focus on aluminum extrusion for the International Patent Calendar for our April issue. The extrusion patents selected for this issue have been recently issued within the past 18 months and cover invented technologies in every business category that aluminum extruders serve, i.e., […]
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Editor’s Note: The focus of this issue’s patent survey is a comparison of primary aluminum invention patents granted in both the U.S. and China in just the past year. In both countries, the issued invention patents are enforceable over a 20-year term. At the same time, the contrast in the present state of primary aluminum […]
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Roll-forming is a manufacturing process that is typically used to manufacture components such as construction panels, structural beams, garage doors, decking, and/or any other component having a formed profile. A roll-forming production process ordinarily operates at room temperature and may be implemented by using a roll-forming machine having work rolls in sequence that receive and […]
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As the recently granted U.S. patents presented here indicate, the additive manufacturing (AM) of aluminum and other light metals is evolving rapidly from what was just two decades ago mainly a prototyping process to a production process that involves automotive, aerospace, medical, and various domestic product industries. In my LMA article from February 2018 on AM […]