SciAps True Demo Stories, Episode 6: Demos Down Under

This edition of True Demo Stories takes us through Australia and New Zealand, where SciAps product specialist Ryan Clair demos the handheld Z-200 C+ and its software in New Zealand's largest thermal power station and with AINDT testing specialists. Here are some of the highlights.

Postcards from the SciAps Z World Tour - Australia and New Zealand Edition

Our first demo in Perth on Monday, Feb. 26, was at a customer site, LMATS (Laboratories for Materials Advanced Testing Services). The meeting was with two of their most tenured arc-spark OES operators, who also happen to be the branch managing directors. We tested dozens of samples from their library of certified reference materials, including blind samples where the Z-200 C+ produced correct Carbon results. On their CRMs, it was easy to compare our less destructive tests with their large arc-spark burns. The argon, sample prep, and calibration techniques were all familiar, just faster compared to their OES.

‍

On Wednesday we stopped in Adelaide, where I demonstrated the Z-200 C+ for about 12 members of AINDT companies (Australian Institute of Non-Destructive Testing), kindly hosted by AIS/Intertek. Once they saw the Alloy+C software and ease of use, they predicted the Z-200 C+ could be used by more operators in the field, compared to the short supply of trained arc-spark OES operators. They were interested in multiple unit orders.

‍Then it was on to Sydney, where we demonstrated the Alloy+C app for a panel of AINDT members in nearby Smithfield. As the attendees arrived and got settled, I overheard some chatter before the demo along the lines of "we'll see if this works" and "looks like a fun toy." It was great to demo our accuracy and repeatability for Carbon on the CRMs. After I was finished, everyone was excited, took extra brochures for coworkers, and requested the presentation in PDF form. I think they are believers now.

‍We wrapped up at Huntly Power station, south of Auckland, NZ, on March 9. In the room were the plant's weld inspectors, material engineers, and plant managers. Upon first look, they had thought the Z-200 C+ was tethered to another box, used as a probe! They were amazed by the size of the Z-200 C+. They showed me their ancient tool used for materials analysis that was a similar size. The scope on their instrument is actually used to focus and “look” for these emission lines with a dial on the side. It was amazing to see this instrument, along with a textbook of emission lines and dial positions. There was no dial position on this instrument for Carbon. We showed what the Z-200 C+ could do on CRMs, but the takeaway from this particular demo was from a customer who brought in his own samples. He only expected to get Carbon analysis. But our LIBS analyzer also measures all other alloying elements. For each test we automatically calculate and display the Carbon Equivalence, C.E. = C% + Mn%/6 + (Cr% + Mo% + V%)/5 + (Cu% + Ni%)/15. The results were very repeatable here and matched his certified pieces perfectly. It was great to spend two weeks here talking to operators with decades of experience using all types of elemental analyzers, and to be sharing with them the breakthroughs we're making here at SciAps. We'll be back!

Clockwise from bottom L: At AIS/Intertek in Adelaide with AINDT members; At AXT in Perth, giving a talk to AINDT members./At Queensland University of Technology, where I'm testing an ALS metallurgical engineer’s samples (inset), and we are looking at spectra of a rock for a professor of analytical chemistry, who turned out to be very experienced in ICP-MS and LIBS benchtop systems./In a training with Stani, an applications engineer for AXT./The analyzers at Huntly Power Station.

‍