The Institute of Space Technology has established the Failure Analysis Center (FAC) to provide research facilities for faculty and students and materials analysis services to local industry and defense organizations. The FAC will consolidate resources from across IST's departments to offer one-stop services like materials analysis, failure analysis, structural integrity assessment, and materials process advisory services. These services currently do not exist under a single organization in the country. The FAC has begun providing consultancy in failure analysis, materials and process selection advice, inspection of materials and finished items, life estimation of parts, and workforce training. It plans to follow international best practices of only developing essential in-house facilities while collaborating with other organizations and experts worldwide.
The Institute of Space Technology has established the Failure Analysis Center (FAC) to provide research facilities for faculty and students and materials analysis services to local industry and defense organizations. The FAC will consolidate resources from across IST's departments to offer one-stop services like materials analysis, failure analysis, structural integrity assessment, and materials process advisory services. These services currently do not exist under a single organization in the country. The FAC has begun providing consultancy in failure analysis, materials and process selection advice, inspection of materials and finished items, life estimation of parts, and workforce training. It plans to follow international best practices of only developing essential in-house facilities while collaborating with other organizations and experts worldwide.
The Institute of Space Technology has established the Failure Analysis Center (FAC) to provide research facilities for faculty and students and materials analysis services to local industry and defense organizations. The FAC will consolidate resources from across IST's departments to offer one-stop services like materials analysis, failure analysis, structural integrity assessment, and materials process advisory services. These services currently do not exist under a single organization in the country. The FAC has begun providing consultancy in failure analysis, materials and process selection advice, inspection of materials and finished items, life estimation of parts, and workforce training. It plans to follow international best practices of only developing essential in-house facilities while collaborating with other organizations and experts worldwide.
Institute of Space Technology (IST), following its vision of establishing state of
the art Centers of Excellence which would chart a path across all the academic departments/programs of our institute, has established a Failure Analysis Center (FAC). The FAC will not only provide a place for research to all the faculty and PhD/MS scholars, but will also be a resource for providing solutions of materials related services to local industry and various defense and strategic organizations. This initiative is expected to fill a large void, as services being offered at FAC are currently not available in the country under a single umbrella. Mainly utilizing the available resources at IST, the facility is being organized by forming a small nucleus which would synergize among the departments, where resources and expertise are scattered, to provide one window services for material related problems. It would support a variety of industries by conducting Material Analysis (MA), Failure Analysis (FA), Structural Integrity Assessment (SIA), Fatigue Life Estimation (FLE) and providing Material & Process Advisory Services (MPAS). The facility, while still in its infancy, has already commenced to provide consultancy in the following areas: Failure Analysis of metal parts/components/systems by applying root cause approach with the aim to ensure avoidance of similar recurrences. Provision of advisory, services or both to the desirous manufactures for:
Identifying/selecting metals & processes (including alternative solutions)
essentially required for developing parts/components either afresh or through reverse engineering.
Inspection of raw materials, on site processing of materials (including
heat & surface treatments) and the finished items.
Estimation of the status of parts/components/systems with view to:
Recommend necessary measures for their restoration (if required &
possible).
Determine the remaining safe life period, for their operational usage.
Establish inspection criterion & intervals for parts/components/systems
during their safe life period.
Training of Human Resource:
Through formal programs at IST.
On-site training on need basis.
In order to provide above stated services/advisory FAC has opted to follow
modern trends being practiced worldwide in such fields/domains. This approach suggests that: Only essentially required state-of- the- art facilities be established in house. A strong pragmatic collaborative network comprising of those organizations which already have some authenticated facilities be formed for gaining benefits of their expertise in specific areas and lowering the operational costs. A vibrant advisory board of domain experts (regardless of their geographical locations) be formed for sharing & exchanging experiences
Organizations must remain connected & engaged with international
community of practitioners & regulators of the domain, for remaining abreast with technological & conceptual developments FAC aims to enhance the scope of its advisory/services gradually, in a phased manner, to assist variety of industries in solving materials related problems at national level.