Throwback to the Technology Days by Gehring LP

Gehring held its 1st Honing Conference and Workshops event on May 10-11, 2017 at the Inn of St. John’s in Plymouth, Michigan. The conference and workshops brought together internal and external experts from the global industry to discuss and propose solutions to advanced manufacturing challenges in surface finish technology applications. The attendees were mostly process and manufacturing engineering personnel responsible for surface finishing in automotive, hydraulics, aerospace & defense part applications, including plant managers, production managers and R&D specialists attended this Gehring conference

The event was kicked off with an “Infinity Cruise” experience on the Detroit River. It gave everyone the chance to network and to get to know each other before the formal technical sessions of the conference got underway. The ambience and the amazing surroundings served as the ideal backdrop to kick off the conference!

Day 1 and 2 of the Conference were held at the Inn of St. John’s Conference Center in Plymouth Michigan, which is in close proximity to the Gehring Livonia plant and again the location, backdrop and high culinary service standard, really provided a “wow” factor for the attendees and guests, and enabled extensive networking opportunities between the participants and the speakers. Unique was the fact that Gehring invited external speakers from Oerlikon, Nanofocus, Quaker Chemical and Siemens to expand the scope of the conference and to attract a wider audience to the event.

During the conference, these presentations and workshops were conducted:

Gehring L.P. and Gehring Technologies GmbH, Michael Schaefer and Dr. Wolfram Lohse, “Advanced Honing Technologies Presentations”
Oerlikon Metco AG, Wohlen, Dr. Peter Ernst, “Surface Enhancement with Thermal Spray Coatings”
NanoFocus, Dr. Christian M. Wichern, “3D Surface Measurement of Cylinder Bore and Liners – Advantages and Challenges”
Quaker Chemical, Frank A. Robinson Jr., “Chemistry and Functions of Honing and Coolant Applications”
Gehring Technologies GmbH, Marcell Wardin, “Form Honing Cylinder Bores – from Development to Mass Production”
Gehring Technologies GmbH, Dr. Wolfram Lohse, “Digital Solutions at Gehring”
Siemens Digital Factory, Dr. Stephan Ihmels, “Mindsphere Application in Large Scale Automotive Production Scenarios”

In addition to the formal presentations at the Conference Center, there was a site visit to Gehring Livonia on Day 1 of the conference for a shop tour and live demo of form honing.

Gehring’s Director of R&D, Michael Schaefer who spearheaded and developed the Honing Conference initiative , commented, “Gehring was honored to host this first unique conference, dedicated to Advanced Honing and Surface Finish technology, in the USA and to provide a high level technical and networking platform for professionals in this field with the leading manufacturers in the automotive and other industry sectors.” Feedback from the attendees was overwhelmingly positive with specific positive mention about the organization, execution and depth of technical subject matter presented.”