NASA SBIR 2006 Solicitation

SMALL BUSINESS CONCERN (Firm Name, Mail Address, City/State/Zip, Phone)
Integran Technologies USA, Inc.
2541 Appletree Drive
Pittsburgh, PA 15241 - 2587
(412) 268-2705

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR/PROJECT MANAGER (Name, E-mail, Mail Address, City/State/Zip, Phone)
Robert Heard
heardr@yahoo.com
2541 Appletree Drive
Pittsburgh, PA 15241 - 2587
(412) 638-1140

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT (Limit 2000 characters, approximately 200 words)
The Grain Boundary Engineering (GBE) approach, successfully demonstrated in Phase I, that microstructural optimization provides a very significant improvement in reducing susceptibility to intergranular crack initiation and growth in conventional wrought Inconel 718. The principal objective of the Phase II research development program is to extend the applicability of the GBE technology from conventional wrought superalloys to more advanced powder metallurgy (PM) alloys, and in particular, the Low Solvus High Refractory (LSHR) developed by NASA. In addition, the program also includes a limited effort to optimize the GBE process for application to wrought Inconel 718Plus. The phase II program will build upon the success of the phase I effort, and will have the following specific technical objectives: (1) develop and optimize GBE processing strategies for optimizing the bulk microstructure of an advanced PM disk alloy developed by NASA (i.e., LSHR) and Inconel 718Plus, (2) develop a cost-effective GBE processing strategy for locally optimizing the microstructure of the PM alloy (i.e., LSHR) at the near surface, and (3) evaluate the mechanical properties of the GBE-processed alloys and benchmark with properties of their conventional counterparts.

POTENTIAL NASA COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words)
Non NASA commercial applications include nickel based superalloy parts in land base gas turbines and automotive diesel engines.

POTENTIAL NON-NASA COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words)
The NASA potential applications are for nickel based superalloy parts in gas turbines.

NASA's technology taxonomy has been developed by the SBIR-STTR program to disseminate awareness of proposed and awarded R/R&D in the agency. It is a listing of over 100 technologies, sorted into broad categories, of interest to NASA.

TECHNOLOGY TAXONOMY MAPPING

Aircraft Engines Metallics