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AFS Announces 2024 Hoyt Memorial Lecturer, 2023 Honorary Papers and Research Award Recipients

A former AFS president will give one of the most prominent addresses in worldwide metalcasting in 2024.

Mike Lenahan (Badger Mining) was among the honorees recently chosen for distinction by the AFS Honorary Lectures & Programs Committee. Lenahan, Senior Industrial Sales at Badger and currently the Immediate Past President of AFS, will present the 2024 Hoyt Memorial Lecture at Metalcasting Congress in Milwaukee.

Established in 1938, the Charles Edgar Hoyt Memorial Lecture is one of metalcasting's most important and influential annual addresses. Over the years, many of the industry's most celebrated leaders, thinkers, and visionaries have delivered the lecture, presenting their unique insights into metalcasting's past, present, and future.

The Honorary Lectures & Programs Committee also recently announced the recipients of three other major awards from AFS.

Receiving the 2023 Howard F. Taylor Award are three representatives of Missouri University of Science & Technology: Suyash Pawaskar, Dr. Laura Bartlett, and Dr. Simon Lekakh. They are the authors of “Mutual B, Ti N Effects on Phase Transformations in Cast Iron: Thermodynamic Consideration and Experimental Verification.”

The Taylor Award recognizes the authors of a paper having the greatest long-range technical significance in the field of cast metals technology. The award-winning paper documents research about the detrimental effects, permissible levels, and mitigation techniques for dealing with boron in the various grades of class iron – a developing concern for industry as the proliferation of boron present in typical charge scrap streams is increasing.

Theodore Schorn (Enkei America) is the winner of the 2023 Ray Witt Award for his presentation at CastExpo 2022, “Executive Safety Responsibility,” in which Schorn provided a thorough review of the executive’s role, responsibility, and potential contribution to plant safety performance.

The Witt Award was established to honor work related to marketing cast metal components and management of metalcasting facilities. The intent is to recognize work that is likely to result in both immediate and lasting benefits for the cast metals industry.

The 2023 AFS Applied Research Award will be presented to the researchers who led “Turbulent Gating Effect on C89833,” an AFS project sponsored by the AFS Copper Division. Andy Shea (AY McDonald) was the principal investigator, along with with co-investigators Paul Clements (Sloan Valve Co.), Gerald Richard (Magma Foundry Technologies Inc.), Andrew Iannettoni (Ford Meter Box Company Inc.), and Jacob Johnson and Jeremy Fischer (both of Foseco). 

This research focused on applying new non-turbulent gating systems and assessing the relative impact gating can have on the more problematic lead-free copper alloys which are replacing the lead-containing copper alloys more prominently used in the past.

The recipients of the Taylor and Witt awards, as well as the Applied Research Award, will be recognized during an awards ceremony at Metalcasting Congress 2023, April 25-27 in Cleveland, Ohio.