A Pratt & Whitney approval is a rare thing, and it took EB Industries years to earn. The company’s engines power military aircraft, commercial jetliners and ships, and they’re almost always used in critical applications where a failed part is potentially catastrophic. The qualification process is correspondingly thorough.
Our engineering staff developed a joining methodology for the application and then proved its efficacy to Pratt & Whitney and to third party observers and inspectors. Parts were tested both destructively and nondestructively, and we wrote detailed work instructions documenting every step of the procedure, from receiving to shipping.
The part we welded for Pratt & Whitney had a complex geometry, which on its own made the weld a challenge. The material and thickness compounded it: the part was made from thin sheets of Waspaloy.
Waspaloy is a nickel based superalloy developed by United Technologies for high temperature applications in extreme environments. It keeps exceptional strength and corrosion resistance at temperatures above 1500° F, which makes it well suited to jet engines. Welding a nickel superalloy wasn’t the hard part, since EB Industries has welded exotic nickel based alloys for years. The challenge was holding tight dimensional tolerances on the cross section of the weld joint across its entire length while maintaining the final sheet metal part dimensions. The proprietary tooling and procedures took multiple iterations and years to perfect, and the result was a reliable, repeatable production process that met or exceeded Pratt & Whitney’s standards and requirements.
