Former investment banker Troy Barratt believes passionately in promoting manufacturing in the developed world – so much so that he gave up his career in Wall Street and then the City of London to buy a subcontract sheet metal fabricating business in Sittingbourne.
In 2012 he purchased 28-year-established sheet metalworking and fabrication company, Contracts Engineering Ltd (CEL) from the previous owners, who wanted to retire. By 2016, turnover had doubled to £2 million per annum.
Part of the £600,000 invested during that time has been used to purchase a BystronicBySprint fibre laser cutting machine capable of processing sheet up to 3 x 1.5 m using a 2 kW fibre laser source. Bought in January 2017, it replaced a 3 kW CO2 laser cutter of the same sheet size capacity dating back to 2002. The new machine joins two pre-existing 100-tonne Bystronic press brakes on the shop floor and a turret punch press acquired in 2013.
“When we took over CEL, the CO2 laser machine’s utilisation rate was under 50% over an 8-hour day shift plus nearly daily overtime,” says Barratt. “We quickly moved to a double shift, 16 hours a day, put a Bystronic service contract in place, and were able to raise the time the machine was cutting to 60%. This is among the highest in the industry for subcontract manufacturers.
“Since the BySprint started operating in early February, utilisation has increased further due the machine’s reliability and efficiency features,” he continues. “We ran it 24/5 for a while to remove a backlog of work and get in front of orders, which allowed us to minimise the cost of bought-in subcontract services during the transition period.”
For further information
www.bystronic.co.uk

Evolving from a small blacksmiths to a 1.5 acre site, John Thorburn& Sons Ltd has grown beyond recognition during its 70-year history. The family-run business that specialises in the construction, agriculture and commercial steel-working sectors has always invested in the latest technology to underpin its continuous growth. This investment strategy has now seen the Scottish company acquire a plasma-cutting machine from Kerf Developments.
To manufacture the numerous components that constitute a complete steel building structure, Duns-based John Thorburn& Sons relied upon its guillotine, punching, steel-working and fabricating equipment until the arrival of a Kerf RUR2500 plasma-cutting machine with UltraSharp technology.
“We recognised that our method of cropping, punching and drilling plates was cumbersome, time consuming and slowing down our throughput,” explains managing director John Thorburn. “All our jobs had to be handled and reworked on a variety of different machines to arrive at a finished part. Additionally, we had to stock a large range of steel bar widths and thicknesses, and this was taking a lot of floor space. Kerf has instantly eliminated all of these issues.”
The Berwickshire-based business specified the RUR2500 with a 6 x 2m bed, so it could use the nesting facility on the Kerf machine to cut up to 50 stanchion base plates in a single set-up.
The stanchion base plates that are required in considerable batches for the assembly of agricultural buildings were previously cut from 400 x 20 mm thick steel bar that was 6400 mm long. By purchasing 4 m x 2 m x 20 mm thick plates instead of bar, the company instantly reduced material costs by over 30%.
For further information
www.kerfdevelopments.com

LHYTE is a new technology designed for industrial laser applications that has been developed by Comau in collaboration with Prima Electro. This modular system, which is intended for both the automotive and the general manufacturing sectors, allows end users to choose a fibre, diode or hybrid laser source, thereby meeting the increasingly varied and flexible needs of the industrial sector.
The unveiling event, which was attended by OEMs, system integrators, partner companies and journalists from all over Europe, opened with a welcome speech by Tobias Daniel (head of sales and marketing for Comau Robotics and Automation Products) who introduced LHYTE technology. The technical and application advantages of this innovative solution for the industrial sector were then described by Maurizio Cremonini (Comau’s head of marketing) and Giovanni Di Stefano (Comau’s head of materials and process technologies) together with Maurizio Gattiglio, Prima Electro executive vice president – laser division (Prima Industrie Group).
Afterwards, Ulrich Thombansen, a laser technology expert from Fraunhofer ILT in Aachen, provided a general explanation of laser solutions and Comau’s latest technologies.
A technology patented by Comau, LHYTE is able to combine the potential of direct and fibre laser sources through a modular and flexible structure. The product is adaptable to any industrial application and enables Comau to meet the needs of a market in continuous evolution, in which manufacturers and system integrators are constantly in search of high-performance, versatile technologies.
For further information
www.comau.com

The new XPR300 plasma-cutting system from Hypertherm is said to represent the greatest leap forward in mechanised plasma cutting ever – and the first place it can be seen in action in the UK is at Esprit Automation’s Nottingham facility.
The XPR300 performs at its best when mounted on Esprit machines, says the company. Cut speeds some 15% faster than the next equivalent system mean production parts can be manufactured at a more rapid pace than ever before. Furthermore, the system offers 20% thicker piercing capacity on stainless steel.
The XPR300 is also fitted with advanced power supply technology that provides active, moment-to-moment system feedback and automatically intervenes to prevent errors that can adversely impact consumable lifespan, improving the machine’s lifetime running costs. Features such as this mean that the XPR300 has half the running costs of its nearest equivalent, says Esprit.
Additional features such as vented water injection ensure good results on aluminium cuts, while connection systems like EasyConnect and QuickLock mean both torches and consumables can be switched-out rapidly. Esprit machines provide an operational base for the XPR300 to work from, whether it’s the flexible Multibevel machine, or the large-scale, multi-headed Viper.
Esprit Automation and Hypertherm’s partnership goes back nearly three decades. In 1990, Esprit chose Hypertherm as its exclusive supplier of plasma cutting technology, allowing both companies to specialise their hardware to complement the other.
For further information www.espritautomation.com

Hot-stamped parts are increasingly replacing traditional metal-formed parts in the manufacture of vehicle frames. For instance, among the trends gaining momentum is the adoption of a new door-ring concept, whereby an element is hot stamped as a single part rather than the usual four parts. With this in mind, Prima Power has released a laser cutter that is focused on this specific application: Laser Next 2130. According to Prima Power, the new model maintains the performance of the existing 1530, but offers increased working volume in the Y-axis to suit the cutting of large, hot-stamped components.
Laser Next 2130 has a working volume of 3050 x 2100 x 612 mm, with a 5 m turntable. To suit throughput in automotive industry applications, this capacity is supported by a trajectory speed of 208 m/min and 2.1 g acceleration. The machine can be equipped with a 3 or 4 kW high-brilliance fibre laser developed and manufactured by Prima Power. Direct motors and transducers are used for the machine’s main axes and focusing head.
Prima Power says it is the only laser machine manufacturer to develop all essential elements of its products in-house, including the company’s new CF series generators.
“We could already offer the best and fastest solution for the cutting of standard sized hot-stamped components,” explains Marco Pivanti, 3D laser product manager, “but we needed an evolution of the Laser Next 1530 featuring an increased Y-axis stroke to allow the processing of larger components, such as the door ring.”
For further information
www.primapower.com