I may have gotten little sleep, but there was no time to be tired (jeez, I sound like finals week). It was my company visit day! We got condolences from the rest of the program since we were the last visit and the only visit after the weekend; we would have less than 48 hours to do our entire presentation. This didn’t deter me, however, as the information would be fresh in my mind, I thrive under pressure, and I’d rather do stuff closer to deadlines (more of an uncertainty principal philosophy rather than procrastination, but I digress). SGL CARBON! I remember when Arielle had briefly given a sentence description of each company and then assigned everyone to a company in class back in the States. I remember hoping for that company she said was really technical and worked with carbon materials. I remember being assigned to the company and overjoyed: my personal research into graphene in high school had spanned at least hundred hours of pure awe at how perfect carbon composites are (note: I said composites; as much as I love carbon as an atom it doesn’t even make my top 5 favorite elements). Hopefully this introduction is good foreshadowing for the nerdy, geeky excitement that will be spilling over this blog post!
Unlike me arriving to the lobby every morning, we arrived at SGL a little early. This gave me and Maxi (one of my favorite germans ever, also a team member) some time to do a little bit of modeling. Please enjoy our photo shoot!
Look at the Camera Maxi. Sigh. 
“Oh NO! Dr. Feick is approaching. Best behavior activated” 
“He’s right next to me. Act chill, act chill! Shoot, I just spell guilt”
We were soon approached by some of our future tour guides, and directed to the lecture hall upstairs. I was instantly delighted: there were full tables with seats, not dinky little tables. I could spread my arms out and take notes nice and comfortably! Listen, ergonomics is important to me. Perhaps the layout was an indication of the lecture, because the presentation was by far the best we have received to date! It was so clear, and the executive delivering the talk expertly answered every single question we came prepared with, even altering my stubborn view on hydrogen fuel cells.
As has been my tradition, I have uploaded my SGL Carbon notes below. As a disclaimer, they aren’t like my other notes: they’re sloppy, written in shorthand, and span 9 pages since this was my company and I was determined to get every single morsel of information I could see myself using. To sum the key points of the talk, however, we learnt that SGL Carbon is essentially a graphite materials and carbon composites materials and parts producer. It sells both the refined material it makes and parts it makes out of the materials. I didn’t realize this was so viable, economically, but it’s sustained over a billion euros in revenue for quite some time. Additionally, we learnt that SGL Carbon is moving in the direction of innovation and growth, by investing into industries that will increasingly be turning to carbon fibers, such as aerospace and hydrogen fuel cells/energy. It reminded me of some previous lectures at different companies where the lecturers all mentioned that innovation in the automotive industry is looking into the future, and making products that will be needed in five+ years, not now. According to those experts, it seemed like SGL Carbon was doing an excellent job.
We then proceeded to the tour of the facility. We first started in the showroom and working our way to the factory: we examined all the little parts and components that they had on display. This was a precursor to the main facility, so that we could see some of the complex parts that were made of carbon composites and graphite materials. I really appreciated this method of showing us what the materials make, and then showing us how the raw materials themselves are made because it adds definition and dimension to the upcoming explanation.
This facility was doing research into how carbon fiber production could be optimized to save money, not focused on manufacturing carbon fiber to sell to industries and consumers. For this reason, the 20 stream line was only operating at 20% capacity, with 4 streams running. That was all we needed to see all the bending, heating, pressing, and rolling processes that strands of carbon fibers undergo before they are made into the material with extraordinary properties that consumers crave. It was manufacturing like we had never seen before: there was no loud banging or large robots welding or fast machines placing thousands of parts per hour. It was just one continuous stream of material from raw to processed: slow and steady. It made it look deceptively simply although it was incredibly complex: with nearly 200 measurements taken per second per part (3 parts, 600 total per second). I’m confident that with a facility like this, SGL Carbon is on the right track to decreasing manufacturing costs for carbon fiber.
Next we were taken to another optimization plant, but this one had a different take on the matter. The carbon fiber placement facility was focused on how carbon fiber materials were used to compose parts, and instead of making the production of raw material more efficient, reducing the wastage of raw materials in making a component. Since carbon fiber isn’t something that can be welded or molded or compressed into a shape, it has be placed into a template and then cut to fit that template. With traditional methods, this means a square block of carbon fiber can be significantly wasted if only a tiny section is needed/used for a part. We proceeded to observe several different approaches to solving this problem: some that SGL Carbon is working on, but mainly solutions and robots from competing companies and startups. It was an interesting take on innovation since a lot of it was being done by outside companies, just facilitated by SGL Carbon. Needless to say, I had all the content I needed for my presentation and I was very happy with everything I had learned!
We headed over for lunch, by far the best lunch we have been provided at a company visit since it was catered Bavarian food, and since I was finally allowed to take pictures again, here’s a mouth watering picture of my food!
Not gonna lie, I have no idea what’s on my plate. All I know is that (1) it’s vegetarian and (2) it’s delicious!
As we headed back to the hotel, I was a happy boy. But also sleepy. And my whole group agreed that it’s important to be well rested, so we all collectively decided to take a nap! We set our rendezvous time at 4pm, at the university, where I proceeded to keep my group hostage until we had a solid plan and presentation outline. Feeling content with what we had, we headed out after 7, since it was Eamonn’s birthday and we were going out to celebrate! On our way home, Eamonn and I got a little cake-thing to celebrate, that we were promised at the bakery was typical Bavarian.
Bavarian cake! Happy Birthday, Eamonn.
Then, the rest of the program went out to celebrate for his birthday! We split up into guys and girls, not cause we’re sexist, but because we realized 20 people at a place for a meal is a lot for a restaurant to handle without reservations (queue Hofbrauhaus). We both went to Mexican places, though. Turns out, 12 people is too much too because we were only allowed to get appetizers. I was a little disappointed, but after seeing their size, I was happy we didn’t get entrees too!
It was so good!
We spent the rest of the night hanging out together, celebrating Eamonn, and eating some ice cream. We all turned in early though because we had hundreds of steps to climb tomorrow – and that’s where I’ll see you next! 🙂