Chemetall Reduced Oil Mist Using An Expensive Coolant

For a company that has been around for more than a hundred years, Chemetall is one that learned a valuable lesson back in 2010: inexpensive coolant is not saving you money, but costing you money.

In a press release issued in 2010 the people at Chemetall explained their switch from a cheap coolant to a more expensive one. The cheap product simply couldn’t keep up with the company’s manufacturing requirements.

To better understand the reason they made the switch – because they did well with the cheap coolant for a number of years – here are some changes that occurred in the manufacturing of aluminum wheels. First of all, the size: more and more car wheels are now custom made, and so they get bigger and bigger. And custom means someone is willing to spend a significant amount of money on a set of wheels – up to 24 in diameter, and even larger.

Then, bigger wheels means that the manufacturing process goes through some changes: instead of creating cast wheels, the demand for forged wheels is on the rise.

So this is how, in 2010 – four years ago – the coolant which worked just fine until then, needed to be changed. Chemetall representatives concluded that the coolant they had been using until then was producing too much oil mist.

The solution?

Chemetall started using a semisynthetic coolant fluid which enhanced lubricity and bioresistance. Other improvements were noticed in the areas of corrosion resistance and detergency. The multiple benefits were soon noticed in the shop: it only took the company 2 months to change the coolant fluid in all their machines.

Another important benefit for Chemetall was that the coolant consumption decreased significantly and the odor in the factory was eliminated almost entirely.