Internship - R&D Innovation engineer H/F/X

Constellium is a world leader in the development and manufacture of high value-added aluminum products and solutions for a wide range of markets and applications, focusing in particular on aerospace, automotive and packaging. Constellium also has nearly 12,000 employees worldwide.

We are committed to minimizing the environmental impact of our operations and improving the environmental footprint of aluminum throughout the value chain.

In our company, safety is essential, it is one of our core values. Our Research and Technology Center, C-TEC Constellium Technology Center, employs about 240 people. Our research is mainly in the field of casting, aluminum transformation and surface treatment.

By joining our company, you will discover a multicultural company which is committed to diversity and the well-being of its employees.

Intership's topic: Refining Fe-Al Secondary Phases for Designing Next-generation Recycling Friendly Aluminium Alloys

Main objective and key accountabilities

Understand nucleation and growth of Fe-Al based secondary intermetallic phases in order to refine them at the lab scale aiming at designing and manufacturing novel recycling friendly next-generation aluminium alloys.

Context & environment

Today’s focus in the aluminium industry is promoting a circular economy, and meeting the US and the EU's ambition of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This means, replacing primary aluminium with post-consumer scrap, which contains larger quantities of intermetallic forming impurities, particularly Fe and Si, which are detrimental to mechanical properties. We need to develop new generations of impurity-tolerant aluminium alloys enabling reduced carbon footprint through increased recycled content. To meet this objective, it is necessary to deepen our understanding of AlFeSi secondary phase nucleation and growth during aluminium alloy solidification.

In this work, we aim at designing next-generation 6xxx and 7xxx recycling-friendly automotive and aerospace alloys. The novel alloys will be manufactured at lab scale and quantified under optical and electronic microscopy techniques.

The candidate will spend his/her internship at Contellium C-TEC R&D center in Voreppe to familiarize with the industrial problematic and aluminium alloy solidification and manufacturing. He/she will help in experimental design and manufacturing of novel recycling friendly next generation aluminium alloys at lab scale. He/she will be focusing on studying the effect of chemistry modification and solidification parameters on the Fe-Al phase nucleation and growth.

In a second step, the candidate will interact with technicians and engineers in order to characterize the microstructures of the newly cast alloys. He/she will adapt image analysis and statistical methods to try and discriminate features of the novel microstructures and compare them with the ones of conventional industrial alloys.

The tutor will be Dr. Georges SALLOUM-ABOU-JAOUDE (Constellium C-TEC, Voreppe, France). The candidate may interact with ongoing PhD collaboration with Sorbonne University and other research projects at SIMAP Grenoble to try and understand the fundamentals of intermetallic nucleation and growth in model aluminium alloys; this will be a unique opportunity for the candidate to work with a world leading industrial and academic team highly specialized in aluminium solidification for developing recycling friendly alloys.

Expected results:

This internship decomposes into several stages:

• Familiarization with the principle of solidification of metallic alloys
• Familiarization with aluminium alloy production and direct chill casting
• Manufacture recycling friendly alloys, preparation of:
  • Experimental protocols
  • Quality inspection/investigation
  • Sample machining and preparation.
  • Homogenization heat treatment of the cast alloys
• Familiarization with sample preparation for metallographic characterization
• Prepare aluminium samples mechanical and chemical etching techniques
• Optical and Scanning Electron Microscopy sample characterization
• Data and image processing of solidification microstructures
• Analysis, recommendation and reporting of the findings

Profile: 

Education level: Bac+5 / M.Sc.

Mechanical Engineering - Physics or Material Science

Competencies & technical & soft skills requirement:

• Engineering student (last year) or Masters (M2) of Physics or Material Science
• Candidate motivated, creative, rigorous, curious, good communication skills and autonomous.
• Knowledge in Material science, and eager to develop experimental skills
• Knowledge of Microsoft Office
• Good communication skills in English and French are essential