May 2025 Volume 7

FORGING RESEARCH

FIA TECHNICAL UPDATE Shifting Seasons, Opportunities, and Project Updates By Dekland Barnum

A s we start to shift from spring to summer, the days get warmer and longer. As we soak in additional sun, I wanted to share with you some opportunities for our industry, provide some project updates, and talk about what FIA has done recently related to automation. There have been several recent project calls specific to the forging (and casting) industry. Two recent project calls we made our members aware of specifically mentioned the forging industry. One was from the additive manufacturing focused group, America Makes via their IMPACT 3.0 project call, which launched in April with a June deadline. Another was a rapid response project call from the automation focused Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute, which also launched in April with an early May deadline. With automation being a focal point for this magazine issue, I am encouraged that some of our members are working on a proposal for the ARM Institute project call. Both groups are Manufacturing Innovation Institutes (MIIs) and receive funding from the government. This is further evidence that castings and forgings continue to be a priority for the Defense Department. Also in April, Deloitte Consulting, on behalf of the Innovation Capability and Modernization (ICAM) office, met with a handful of our members for interviews as part of their study on the industrial base, capacity, and the pain points of our industry. While FIA did not participate in, or influence the companies selected, we were grateful to see so many of our members were interviewed for this study. To me, this bodes well for more opportunities in the future. Pivoting from project calls to project updates, I wanted to highlight the progress on one of the ongoing projects FIA is involved in. As I shared in my last update, FIA has partnered with the Non-Ferrous Foundry Society (NFFS) as they develop their existing database, known as ICON. The goal of this project is visibility of FIA member capabilities and tooling to military procurement personnel. Since my last update, the first beta testing for the database kicked off in March, which FIA provided input on. The next step is to involve our members in the beta testing as well, which is ongoing. If you or your organization is interested in participating, please reach out to me. The value of participating would be access to an initial beta test site, as well as the opportunity to provide feedback to the development team on database features and functionality. The second and last update I wanted to give related to projects is one I have received several requests for an update on. In March

of 2024, FIA put out a request for white papers in collaboration with the Army Research Lab (ARL). The reason a list of projects has not been announced is because no projects have been formally awarded yet. Based on the latest schedule I have from our partners, I expect we will have something to announce in June, although we are working to expedite that wherever possible. Until formal awards are complete, we must maintain the integrity of the process and not disclose the results. I am very encouraged by the recent progress made and am very excited to share the results of the call as soon as we are able to do so. Look forward to getting more information on this very soon! With the focus on automation in this issue, this is a good opportunity to mention the Automation Seminar that took place at the start of the spring on March 18 and 19. We had a total of about twenty attendees at FIA Headquarters, with excellent and practical presentations on implementing automation from Jim Morris at Automation for Manufacturing, as well as Marty Ringelberg from Adaptec Solutions. Many thanks to both speakers, who also helped us secure a tour of Burton Industries. It was an excellent tour, I was especially appreciative that we all got ample time to ask questions and speak with Burton Industries as well as IC Automation, who helped integrate the automation onsite and facilitated the tour. As our industry continues to automate, if you have implemented automation as an organization and are interested in presenting on this at a future event, please let me know. Additional perspectives within our industry allow us all to learn and grow together, especially at events such as this. In terms of other recent events, our Annual Meeting of Members was well attended this year down in Marco Island. We had a lot of great presenters on a variety of topics from economics to engaging community colleges to tariffs and yes, automation as well. There were many activities as well, I for one had a great time on the Catamaran Cruise with some of you. We also had two successful board meetings. On the Foundation side, the FIERF Board of Trustees approved over $163k in funding for four projects this year. As always, I deeply appreciate the continued support we are able to provide for the forging related research our Magnet Schools are doing, all made possible by the generous donations from our members. I also thank the Technical Committee for its continued involvement in reviewing and recommending these projects, in particular Graham McIntosh and Jim Miller. After longstanding involvement with the committee and five years as its chair, Graham announced that he will be stepping down as the chair and named Jim Miller to take up the mantle of chair on

FIA MAGAZINE | MAY 2025 86