METALLURGIST

Manufacturing Engineer / Metallurgist

The Manufacturing Engineer / Metallurgist is responsible for supporting safe, consistent, and quality-driven iron foundry operations through metallurgical control, laboratory oversight, process improvement, defect analysis, and manufacturing engineering support. This position works closely with operations, quality, melt, molding, core room, maintenance, engineering, sales, suppliers, and customers to help ensure castings meet customer requirements, internal quality standards, and production needs.

This role is plant-floor focused and requires practical foundry judgment, strong technical knowledge of gray and ductile iron, and the ability to use data and hands-on observation to improve casting quality, reduce scrap, strengthen process discipline, and support continuous improvement in safety, quality, delivery, cost, and morale.

Include the following. Other duties may be assigned.

• Establish, monitor, and improve metallurgical controls for gray iron and ductile iron production, including chemistry targets, carbon equivalent, inoculation, magnesium treatment, temperature control, and metal traceability.
• Review and analyze charge materials, returns, alloys, additives, inoculants, magnesium treatment materials, and other melt inputs to support consistent metal quality and cost control.
• Analyze spectrometer results, test bars, hardness readings, microstructure, nodularity, nodule count, and mechanical properties to confirm conformance to customer and internal requirements.
• Work with the Melt Department to troubleshoot chemistry, temperature, slag, chill, carbide, shrinkage, gas, inclusions, inoculation fade, treatment issues, hardness variation, and related metallurgical concerns.
• Audit ladle readiness, pour temperatures, hold times, metal transfer practices, furnace readiness, and pour-window discipline to reduce process variation and improve casting quality.

• Oversee or coordinate laboratory testing for chemical composition, tensile properties, hardness, microstructure, sample preparation, product verification, and special testing requirements.
• Use destructive and non-destructive testing methods as appropriate to evaluate castings, production samples, raw materials, and process performance.
• Maintain test procedures, calibration records, gage control, equipment condition, sample identification, and documentation needed to support accurate and reliable laboratory results.
• Prepare, review, and retain material certifications, chemical and physical reports, customer documentation, internal quality records, and required traceability information.

• Lead technical troubleshooting of casting defects including gas porosity, shrinkage, inclusions, slag, misruns, cold shuts, cracks, hardness variation, chill/carbides, penetration, burn-on, scabs, veining, and dimensional or process-related defects.
• Use scrap data, Pareto analysis, casting photos, sectioning, fracture review, metallography, production history, and input from hourly employees and supervisors to identify likely root causes.
• Develop and support corrective actions involving melt chemistry, pouring temperature, gating/riser changes, inoculation, sand properties, core quality, venting, coatings, binder systems, tooling, handling, and standard work.
• Track the effectiveness of corrective actions and help standardize successful improvements through training, documentation, process audits, and updated control methods.

• Plan, coordinate, and support process trials for new castings, tooling revisions, new materials, gating or riser changes, process parameter changes, and quality-improvement projects.
• Support launch of new and revised castings by reviewing drawings, specifications, material requirements, sampling plans, test requirements, manufacturability concerns, and process risks.
• Develop, update, and maintain procedures, work instructions, standard operating procedures, inspection plans, control plans, sampling requirements, and technical documentation.
• Assist with integration of new or modified equipment, tooling, gauges, laboratory equipment, and process controls into foundry production.
• Use production data, lab results, scrap trends, and structured problem solving to improve throughput, reduce variation, support uptime, lower cost, and improve consistency across shifts.

• Support sand and core process control by reviewing sand properties, binder performance, core strength, venting, coating performance, and process variation with responsible department leaders.
• Work with molding and core room leadership to identify process settings, material conditions, or work practices contributing to scrap, rework, or customer concerns.
• Provide technical input on gating, rise ring, chills, sleeves, filters, venting, core prints, coatings,…