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A D V A N C E D M A T E R I A L S & P R O C E S S E S | J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 9 2 5 In 1990, Alcan decided to enter the U.S. aluminum ABS market and was the first to launch a dedicated au- tomotive solution heat treat line at its Kingston (Ontario) plant. The company quickly understood the need for an out- er quality blanking operation. Avoiding the cost of opening its own facility, Al- can instead partnered with ABC. For the next two decades, ABC would remain the only source of outer quality blanks besides the simple cut-to-length lines of the rolling mills. ALUMINUM HOOD PROGRESS When the 1990 Lincoln Town Car hood launched, it was the third alumi- num hood in a row at Ford, and the first time that a new aluminum hood had followed an existing aluminum hood in amodel changeover. By that time, Alcoa and RMC had been interacting with the auto industry for more than a decade, and they understood the intense level of technical and commercial support expected by the stamping plants. Engi- neers on both sides had made strides in understanding each other’s vocabular- ies and miscommunications were slow- ly fading. But not completely: At a review meeting shortly after the launch, the plant noted a surge in surface quality defects on incoming material. An inves- tigation by the plant and Davenport’s distressed technical support engineer revealed that Alcoa had been shipping the blanks just as they had for the previ- ous model. At extra cost, they had con- tinued to flip the blanks upside down so that they would conform to the tog- gle draw configuration of the old tool set, in which the part was formed with the “good side” down. However, for the new model, Ford had engineered a more material-efficient stretch-draw tool, in which the metal was processed “good side” up. Since the launch, the carefully obtained outer quality surface had been hidden from view on the in- side of the hood. Somehow, no one had explained the new configuration to the supplier. The blanks did not need turn- ing anymore, and Alcoa learned an- other lesson when the stamping plant promptly asked for a price reduction. How aluminum ABS was bought by Ford was at the heart of the con- fusion about the tool configuration. When Ford Purchasing had been asked to procure the metal for the first alu- minum hood 12 years earlier, it had naturally turned to the team with the most experience dealing with alumi- num sheet. That team was the Climate Control Division (CCD), which produced all-aluminum heat exchangers. CCD’s aluminum sheet buyers were familiar with brazing sheet and fin stock, but were ill-prepared for the intricacies of the tool development process for large body panels. When Product Develop- ment specified aluminum for the hood of the upcoming 1992 Crown Victoria and Mercury Grand Marquis sedans, the supply frustration experienced during development of the last two sets of tools prompted Stamping Engineer- ing to successfully request that alumi- num ABS purchasing be transferred to the traditional steel sheet buyers. Aluminum ABS was finally entering normalcy. The 1992 Crown Victoria hood was noticeable for another reason: This was the first time an aluminum hood would be produced in a modern high- speed transfer press. The result was an intense focus on productivity by up- per management. They expected sig- nificant improvements over the Town Car hood, which ran in a convention- al line more than 30 years old. Instead, the first reports showed low effective yields coupled with high rework. The investigation that followed would re- veal yet another aluminum peculiari- ty—the unique ability to generate small metal flakes during trim and pierce op- erations. Steel tooling standards were simply not adequate for aluminum. Un- der the relentless eye of upper manage- ment, a hastily installed ad hoc solution mitigated the problem well enough for productivity to finally improve. The quest to understand the mysteries of 1990 Lincoln Town Car with aluminum hood. The debut of the 1992 Crown Victoria represents the first time an aluminum hood was produced in a modern high-speed transfer press.