Technology Centre

TII’s pursuit of engineering excellence has always been backed by robust R&D initiatives. To meet the ever increasing demand from industry for next generation materials, products and processes, the technology center was established to keep Tube Investments of India ahead of the curve.

Growing steadily over the past decade, the center evolved into an energetic engineering team focused on incubation, adoption of new technology, leading to business success and growth. The trigger for many of these initiatives has been proactive interactions with customers, technical universities, professional associations and organization in the engineering field. Synergizing the initiatives across various divisions, the strength of CTC is in areas of product and process engineering, design and CAE capabilities, developing internal test standards and research oriented projects. Corporate technology center also works on business driven R&D projects with specific focus on “metal forming”, “thermal processing” technologies and “product design”. TII continuously works with reputed Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) firms to benchmark its solutions.

The state-of-the-art computing facilities in the centre enable the organization to do virtual simulation and prototyping of new products. Also these facilities are oriented towards process simulation to facilitate improved process control in manufacturing. The outcome of engineering design analysis is validated through experimental techniques such as real-time strain measurements while testing and validating the parts.

Virtual prototyping also assists in the design of robust manufacturing processes and in rapid tool development. Tooling and fixtures design and development is another capability of CTC which is widely used for internal improvement projects.

The following capabilities are available at the corporate technology center:

Full-fledged metallurgical laboratory with optical microscopes, micro and macro hardness testers, static and dynamic test frames, non-destructive test facilities
3D CAD modeling – Products and Assembly
Numerical Modeling – Product and Process using FEA
Process Optimization – Design of Experiments (DoE)
Prototyping – Products & Processes
Advanced Material Characterization facilities like Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD)
Investigation – Failure analysis & Benchmarking

The Murugappa Group has signed an MoU with the Centre for Industrial Consultancy and Sponsored Research (IC&SR) at IIT Madras. This MoU facilitates joint initiatives to identify areas of research work between Murugappa Group companies and the respective Departments at IITM. TII R&D Engineers register for masters and doctoral research programs at top Indian institutes such as IITs, NITs and BITS Pilani, as and when programs of interest are available to candidates. TII along with group company CUMI is a co-sponsor of “Nano Functional Material Technology” Center hosted by IITM. Areas of research include development of nano-particle wear coatings, corrosion resistant coatings and energy storage devices. CTC also facilitates internship, sponsored research programs with Masters or PhD from various colleges for cross pollination of ideas with academia.

Product Performance Simulation in FEA

Manufacturing Process Simulation in FEA

Collaboration with Academia

Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M):

The Murugappa Group has a MoU with the Centre for Industrial Consultancy and Sponsored Research (IC&SR) at IIT Madras. This MoU facilitates joint initiatives to identify areas of Research work between Murugappa Group companies and the appropriate Departments at IIT M. TII has taken this forward by way of having, on an average, three running projects at any point of time with Departments of Metallurgical Engineering and Material Sciences, Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics. The typical duration of a project is about six months. Upto Mar 2013, TII has completed 13 such projects.

TII R&D Engineers register as “external candidates” for Master of Science leading on to Doctorate programs with the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, as also the Department of Applied Mechanics of IITM. TII along with its sister company CUMI is a co-sponsor of “Nano Functional Materials Technology Center” hosted by IITM. Areas of identified research work include development of Nano particle wear coatings, corrosion resistant coatings and energy storage devices. With the Center for Continuing Education (CCE) at IIT Madras, TII has started a Technology Appreciation Program. The program targets engineers in various functions across TII and aims to provide a refresher on aspects of Mechanical Engineering, Metallurgy and Applied Mechanics.

Technical Papers

Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M):

TII encourages its research engineers to participate in professional seminars and exchange knowledge. TII engineers have published many papers in international conferences. References of recently published papers are given below:

Title	Venue	Date	Abstract
Control of UFG Microstructure in Welded Carbon Steel Tubes by Cold Drawing and Annealing	Transactions of the Indian Institute of Metals	30-Mar-14	Abstract
“Effect of tempering temperature and time on microstructure and mechanical properties of 26MnB5 martensitic steel tubes”	Procedia Structural Integrity	May-19	Abstract
Analysis and Implementation of Dual Pick and Place Operation in Smart Manufacturing Domain	IEEE Conference	Mar-18	Abstract
Prototype, emulation, implementation and evaluation of SCARA Robot in industrial environment	Elsevier Journal	Jul-18	Abstract
Effect of prior austenitic grain size and tempering temperature on the energy absorption characteristics of low alloy quenched and tempered steels	https://www.sciencedirect.com	February 14, 2018	Abstract
Effect of HF welding process parameters and post heat treatment in the development of micro alloyed HSLA steel tubes for Torsional applications	7th Annual congress on Materials Research and Technology 2017, Berlin, Germany	February 20-21, 2017	Abstract
Effect of material characteristics on the formability of solenoid casings	Materials And Product Design AMPD 2015, NIT,Surat	Jan, 2015	Abstract
Parametric Studies on Side Impact Beam Tube	5th International and 26th All India Manufacturing Technology, Design and Research Conference, AIMTDR 2014, IIT Guwahati, India	Dec, 2014	Abstract
Development of stepped tubular components for automotive application using Tube Extrusion process	Automotive Material and Manufacturing Conference 2014, ARAI Forging Division, Pune	April, 2014	Abstract
Development of Tubular stabilizer bar for commercial vehicle using advanced high strength steel material	Automotive Material and Manufacturing Conference 2014, ARAI Forging Division, Pune	April, 2014	Abstract
Influence of manufacturing processes and their sequence of execution on fatigue life of axle house tubes in automobiles	http://www.sciencedirect.com	December, 2013	Abstract
Nanocrystalline diamond (NCD) coatings on high speed steel and WC-Co tools for metal forming applications	TMS 2013, San Antonio, TX, USA	March 3-7, 2013	Abstract
Compression behavior and energy absorption of aluminum alloys for automotive application	International Congress on Computational Mechanics and Simulation (ICCMS), IIT Hyderabad	December 10-12, 2012	Abstract
Effect of residual stress on fatigue life	ICSMA16 conference at IISc, Bengaluru	August 20-24, 2012	Abstract
Tribological properties of lubricants with dispersions of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs)	ICONSAT 2012 International Conference on Nano Science and Technology, Hyderabad, India	January 20-23, 2012	Abstract

The outcome of R&D initiatives has culminated in identification of new business opportunities to develop high strength steel tubular and sheet metal parts largely oriented towards the automotive industry.

These competencies developed at this center enable TII to deal with customers globally and helps in integrating our development processes with those of our customers.