On November 11, the kick-off meeting of AUTOTREAT “New autonomous power supply based on real-time electrochemical measurement for anodising treatments” (EUS-20210301), the new international innovation project led by the Technology and R&D area of M&M Group in consortium with the companies Talento Transformación Digital S.L., Helmholtz-Zentrum hereon GmbH and Plating electronic GmbH, was held. This first meeting of the project took place at the headquarters of the latter in Sexau (Germany).
Funded by the Center for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI) and co-financed by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe Framework Program, AUTOTREAT was selected in the 2021 Eurostars-3 call for proposals in 2nd position in the Spanish ranking and 17th in the European ranking.
What are AUTOTREAT’s objectives?
The main objective of AUTOTREAT is the development of an autonomous power supply capable of adjusting to the electrochemical parameters in real time of one of the most used surface treatments in the aerospace sector: anodizing.
Thus, the control unit of the rectifier will be developed by the consortium throughout the project, thus guaranteeing the quality of the process and reducing the number of defective parts, and avoiding the optimal selection of the anodizing parameters through a trial and error procedure. In addition, this development contributes to ensuring process quality and reducing the number of defects and waste.
What does AUTOTREAT mean in terms of sustainability?
- It reduces lead time and scrap by 20 % by modifying any deviations due to material, geometry changes and contact problems.
- This improvement reduces energy consumption by 87%, water consumption by 26%, CO2 emission by 64%, waste generation by 81% and atmospheric emission of Cr (VI) by 29%.
- The project is environmentally and worker health and safety friendly, as it avoids the use of products listed in Annex XIV of REACH SVHC (Substances of Very High Concern).
The AUTOTREAT project officially started on October 1, 2022 and is expected to end on January 31, 2025.
