Growth fund

Clay Cross based N&R Needham has been awarded £52,425 from the University of Derby (via its Invest to Grow fund) to invest in new machinery that will broaden its measuring capacity and allow the company to take on work that it could not have inspected previously.

Joe Needham, N&R Needham

The initial funding has already been used to purchase and install a CNC CMM. Since then, N&R Needham received further Invest to Grow funding that has been used to purchase and install a CNC turning centre, and provide training for current employees.
For further information
www.derby.ac.uk/business-services

Record-breaking steel supports

The William Cook group, based in Sheffield, has cast the first of up to 50 record-breaking steel supports for a flagship new viaduct to be employed by the Paris Metro system.

A cast steel column is being developed to support the 600m-long viaduct and elevated metro station in a multi-million project led by French architect Marc Mimram and the Parisian transport agency RATP. Weighing in at as much as 12 tonnes and up to 7m tall, the columns are the largest castings ever poured at William Cook’s Sheffield foundry.
A pair of full-size prototypes has already been cast by the company.
For further information www.william-cook.co.uk

£15m pledge for engineering education

Universities Minister Jo Johnson has announced funding of up to £15m to support the establishment of a new higher education provider specialising in high-quality engineering courses.

The New Model in Technology & Engineering (NMiTE) aims to become the first new ‘greenfield’ university in the UK for 30 years, addressing the growing need for engineering talent in sectors such as advanced manufacturing. NMiTE is taking a radical approach to training the next generation of engineers, including having a 50:50 gender balance target, 6-12 month integrated work placements, and recruiting graduates from non-traditional backgrounds.
For further information www.gov.uk

Successful open house for Mills CNC

Mills CNC, the exclusive distributor of Doosan machine tools in the UK and Ireland, has reported that its open house last month saw over 200 visitors attending the two-day event.

Taking place at the company’s technology campus in Leamington, Mills used the open house to show manufacturers a number of new Doosan machines, many of which were making their UK debuts at the event.
“As well as generating significant machine tool sales during the two-day event, the number of serious and genuine sales leads and enquiries taken at the open house was also particularly encouraging, especially as a high percentage of these came from new customers [OEMS through to precision subcontractors] visiting our facility for the very first time,” says managing director Kevin Gilbert.
For further information www.millscnc.co.uk

Best ever EMO for Walter Ewag

Walter Ewag UK is reporting the “best ever EMO” after orders valued at more than €30m were placed at the show for Walter and Ewag tool grinders/eroders, and Walter tool measurement machines. The record order intake for more than 100 machines does not include orders taken for the other United Grinding Group brands exhibited.

Included in the host of new developments and machines shown at EMO by Walter was the Helitronic Vision Diamond 400L two-in-one tool grinding and erosion machine – for PCD, carbide, HSS, ceramic, cermet and CBN tools from 3 to 315 mm diameter and up to 420 mm long – and the Heliset Plus manual measuring device which is said to help optimise the erosion (machining) times of complex tools by up to 30%. Ewag’s display included the new six-axis Ewag Compact Line for the grinding (including peripheral grinding) of inserts in tungsten carbide, cermet, ceramic, PCBN and PCD.
For further information www.walter-machines.com