SFSA Casteel Reporter – June 2025

Casting Segregation and Riser Performance, and Future Leaders Meetings

There will be a subject-focused/Future Leaders group meeting in Cedar Falls, IA on August 20-22, hosted by University of Northern Iowa. The main topics of the meeting will be segregation in castings and riser sleeve performance and consistency. The tentative schedule includes presentations from subject matter experts, a roundtable discussion, and a tour of a local foundry. Registration and additional details will be available soon. Please contact Tory for questions.”

Research Review, July 8-10

Please make your plans to participate in the annual SFSA Research Review on July 8-10. This year’s meeting will be held in-person in Rosemont, IL. The Review covers the latest in both Carbon & Low Alloy and High Alloy steel casting research under the AMC and STAR programs. The meeting is also your opportunity to interact with the researchers and provide industry steering. The event vets our research portfolio to select the R&D projects to be featured at the National T&O. Registration can be found here. Registration is required and must be completed by June 23.

Similar to previous years, we request you consider inviting a handful of key contacts at your customer or even a potential customer for the Design Day on July 8^th. A separate registration link is provided for non-members here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2025DIDDESIGNDAY

For any questions, contact Caelan Kennedy (ckennedy@sfsa.org).

Additional Keel Bars Needed

To support the development of our carbon & low alloy atlas, we are looking for additional standard keel block legs:

• Carbon steel grades like AISI 10xx (C-Mn) such as WCA/WCB/WCC with low (.20% or lower) C or high (.30% or higher) C
• Lower alloyed nickel-chrome-moly grades like AISI 86xx (.55% Ni, .50-.65% Cr, .20% Mo) with high (.35% or higher) C
• Higher alloyed nickel-chrome-moly grades like AISI 43xx (1.80% Ni, .50-.80% Cr, .25% Mo)

As-cast and bars from same heat (chemistry) would be preferred.  Heat chemistry or mechanicals would be appreciated, but not required.  Please contact Caelan or Tory for shipping details.

Cast in Steel 2026 – Horseman’s Axe

Cast in Steel 2026 Season 2 will be a competition to produce a Horseman’s axe using casting. 

Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland, used an axe to defeat Henry de Bohun in single combat at the start of the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. Given that Bruce was wielding the axe on horseback, it is likely that it was a one-handed horseman’s axe. They enjoyed a sustained revival among heavily armored equestrian combatants in the 15th century.

Grand Prize will be $25,000 for the winning team

IMPORTANT EVENTS & SUBMISSION DATES

Friday, December 5, 2025        Proposed teams, and preliminary plan requested.  

Friday, March 27, 2026             Project video, technical report, are due.

Friday, March 27, 2026             Horseman’s axe shipped by.
April 13-17, 2026                      Cast in Steel performance testing

More information here: https://castinsteel.org

Casting Dreams 2026 Competition is Kicking Off!

We’re excited to announce the launch of the Casting Dreams 2026 competition!

As a quick refresher—Casting Dreams is a metalcasting national competition created by SFSA for students ages 8-18. It’s a fun, hands-on opportunity for young people to design and create their own metal castings using any type of metal.

Projects can be any student-made cast metal object, using either scratch molds or custom molds, as long as the final casting weighs 10 lbs. or less.

Interested in Hosting a Local Competition?

We’d love to have you involved! If you’re interested in hosting a Casting Dreams local competition, just visit www.castingdreams.org and fill out the Host form. We’ll follow up with next steps and are here to support you in making your event a success in any way we can!

Winners from local competitions will advance to the National Competition in April.

Interested in being a Sponsor?

Just visit www.castingdreams.org and fill out the Contact Us form. We’ll reach out with next steps.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to Renee Mueller at rmueller@sfsa.org.

We’re looking forward to another great year of creativity, innovation, and metalcasting with students from across the country!

Cast in Steel – FEF Auction

It’s time for the annual FEF auction!

We’re excited to announce this year’s auction featuring George Washington’s Swords from the 7th Annual Cast in Steel Competition, hosted by the Steel Founders’ Society of America (SFSA).

Auction Dates:            June 16 – June 30
Minimum Bid:              $165.00

Bids can be placed on any of the available swords, and the highest bidder for each will receive the corresponding piece. All proceeds from the auction will go directly to the participating schools to support their scholarship funding.

To learn more about the swords and place your bid, click here or visit the FEF website at www.fefinc.org.

Note: The winning sword from the 2025 Cast in Steel competition—created by Youngstown State University (pictured above)—will not be included in the auction.

This is a unique chance to own an original student casting and help support our FEF schools. Bid high and bid often!

Auction winners may also consider loaning or donating the sword back to the school to inspire and encourage future students.

Thank you for supporting FEF and the bright future of our industry!

Next Generation Manufacturing Meeting

SFSA NGM members will be able to learn about the state of the industry by attending Automate’s Robotic Grinding & Finishing Conference in Minneapolis, MN on July 22-23 (registration required).  A group dinner and round table discussion will be setup – RSVP with Dave.

Ultrasonic Testing Round Robin

If you use ultrasonic inspection for NDT and have not contacted Dave to participate in our round robin study (US locations only for now), please do so.  This round robin will establish the state of the industry and focus on-going research to develop a commercial practice.

79^th Technical & Operating Conference

The conference and workshop will be December 10-13 at the Loews Hotel in Chicago.  If you would like to recommend a topic and presenter, please contact Dave.

Fall Leadership Meeting

Mark your calendars to attend the 2025 Fall Leadership Meeting on September 19-22, 2025 at the Hotel Terra in Jackson Hole, WY. Business sessions will include:

• Bringing Military Practicality to Foundry AI, Fred Addy, Abelian
• Trade and Tariff Update, Dan Pickard, BIPC
• Concurrent Design of Materials and Systems, Dr. Charlie Kuehmann, SpaceX
• Economic Outlook, Dr. Chris Kuehl, Armada
• State of the Steel Casting Industry, Raymond Monroe, SFSA
• Invited Speakers: Matt Robinson, Southwest Research Institute
• SFSA Market Forecast

An email with hotel and registration details will be sent to members later this month.

Remember to Nominate Your Student Interns for the 2025 SFSA Foundation Scholarships!

The Steel Founders’ Society Foundation (SFSA) is excited to offer $2,000 scholarships to student interns who have worked at an SFSA member foundry during 2025. These scholarships recognize the valuable contributions of student interns and support their future in the steel casting industry.

Scholarship Opportunities Include:

• The Schumo Scholarship
• The Peaslee Scholarship (project must focus on melting or refining)
• Jim and Betsy Cooke Memorial Scholarship Fund
• Christoph Beckermann Memorial Scholarship Fund

Eligibility Requirements:

To be considered, interns must:

• Work at an SFSA member foundry during 2025
• Complete a defined project (not just serve as an extra set of hands)
• Submit a written paper and PowerPoint presentation detailing their project
• Have their submission reviewed and approved by a supervisor
• Be willing to present their project at the 2025 National T&O Conference in Chicago on Friday, December 5, 2025.

 How to Apply:

1. Submit a paper and PowerPoint about their completed project
2. Make sure both are reviewed and approved by a supervisor
3. Email all materials to Renee Mueller at rmueller@sfsa.org by August 15, 2025

Questions? Contact Renee at rmueller@sfsa.org or 847-431-5405.

Encourage your interns to apply! This is a great opportunity to recognize their hard work—and help them take the next step in their careers.

Scholarship funds are to be used by the student to pay for qualified educational expenses as defined by the Internal Revenue Service.

Introductory Training Available

Metal For America (METAL) is a US Department of Defense sponsored program offering online training and in-person bootcamps and is intended to strengthen and diversify the U.S. metal manufacturing workforce.

More information is available here: https://www.sfsa.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/METAL-Online-Training-In-Person-Bootcamps-Now-Available.pdf and at https://www.metalforamerica.org/

Market News

ITR reports that a revision to historical U.S. Nondefense Capital Goods New Orders (excluding aircraft) shows that capital expenditures contracted from early 2023 through late 2024, reflecting the effects of an inventory overstock cycle. The revision had only a minor impact on recent months. Given increased uncertainty and softening in leading indicators, ITR lowered the New Orders forecast and reduced the growth rate outlook. However, there is anticipated growth still in 2025 and 2026, followed by a plateau in 2027.

In May, the U.S. Census Bureau released revised historical data for New Orders. While the extent of the revisions varied by series, the most significant revision was to Construction Machinery, which now shows a plateau rather than growth through much of 2023 and part of 2024. ITR’s forecasts remain broadly aligned with prior outlooks, though a more subdued capex recovery this cycle is anticipated due to softer leading indicators and increased uncertainty.

SFSA Business Trends

To benchmark your facility with other steel foundry members, SFSA encourages you to participate in the monthly SFSA business trends survey – only participants have access to the results. The quarterly data will no longer be included in the Casteel Reporter. Please complete the business trends survey for May 2025: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SFSA_BTB_May25. Survey results are provided to participants early the following month.

Casteel Commentary

We need the members of SFSA to support the critical effort we have to develop the people we need for in the industry’s future.

The steel casting industry faces persistent challenges to provide the castings needed to sustain our economy.  Two issues have been identified in our strategic framework that are key: profitability to create the capital we need for investment and needed for developing the next generation of steel foundry people.

SFSA collaboration with DoD OSD has supported a substantial effort to find and develop the artisans and technical experts we will need for our future production.  The Cast in Steel Competition has proven to be capable of reaching college students for our industry.  Casting Dreams has begun to reach younger people to change the understanding and culture to identify and develop the highly skilled artisans we need.

Cast in Steel has been successful and with the added support from OSD, we had over 300 students participate and are finalizing a television program intended to show that artisans and professionals in steel casting production are creatively doing important things to provide the basic infrastructure and support to provide economic and national security.  We are striving to show that our community of casting producers needs young people who are interested in a team that is making meaningful contributions for our world.  The current Cast in Steel details are on the website: https://www.sfsa.org/subject-areas/castinsteel/

To be successful, we need to expand the Cast in Steel competition to include skilled artisans as well as educated professionals.  We need more hands in production roles than in the office.  To extend the value of Cast in Steel to these needed artisans, we are recruiting teams to participate from technical, vocational and community colleges.  Many of you, our members, are already engaged locally with technical institutions that are maker spaces, vocational trainers for welders, machinists, etc.  We need your help to identify a key point of contact in your area and be willing to sponsor Cast-in-Steel teams from these institutions for the 2026 competition.

This will obviously provide you with a direct benefit in identifying and recruiting some of the best students.  If you let us know, we can reach out and help form these teams so that we can expand our reach and meet this need.  Please use the flyer and us to develop this increased participation from a group of valuable people we need for our future.

 Our aim is bigger and we need your support for that as well.  If we want the artisans we need, we need to reach younger kids than college or even high school.  Some studies suggest we need to at least let kids from 8 to 15 see the opportunity of becoming an artisan in our industry as creative and valuable.  Casting Dreams for 2 years has been an initial effort to do this,  https://castingdreams.org.  The events have worked but we need to increase the number of events and provide continuity to become effective.  We need member plants to help us do Casting Dream events in their community.

SFSA members have been open to sponsoring the event but lack the staffing and resources to do it. 

This year we are planning to reach out to staff and organize the event at your plant.  Our plan is to work with you to create a fun casting event for the children of your employees, local groups like scouts or 4H, schools with vocational tracks or maker spaces.  We can work with you to do the administrative and logistical heavy lifting to make this work.  Our intent is to provide this type support for a few years and expect it will become an annual event your plant uses for community relations and recruiting. Please help us with Cast in Steel by supporting local teams and identifying institutions that we can work with to get participation.  Let us help you do Casting Dreams in your community.  Email us, monroe@sfsa.org and rmueller@sfsa.org

Raymond