Success for Renishaw apprentices

Five degree apprentices from Gloucestershire-based Renishaw secured second place for their entry in the UK’s ‘Engineers without Borders’ competition. As part of the ‘Engineers for People Design Challenge’, the apprentices had to create an engineering brief based on real-world problems that would improve the lives of the people living in two towns in northern Peru. The team – Ella Brisland, Marcus Evans, Charlie Lodge, Ezra Price and Oliver Tutton – are currently in year one of a five-year Level 6 apprenticeship at Renishaw.

Together, the team developed a solution for Lobitos and Piedritas, two towns that experience serious sanitation problems. The apprentices’ solution consisted of a combination of biodigesters and oxidation ponds that plumbs sewage through the system, creating a sanitary sewage facility and turning waste into usable by-products. The system breaks sewage into clear effluent that can be processed and used for drinking water and sludge which can be deployed as fertiliser, providing a healthier area to live.

For further information www.renishaw.com

Tower storage improves efficiency

Founded in 1995 as a machinery maintenance firm, Mechtop now has over 50 employees designing and building conveyor systems, tanks, pipework and custom steel structures such as railings and staircases. Located in Wangen bei Olten in northern Switzerland, the multi-faceted company needs a high degree of flexibility in its day-to-day manufacturing operations, so has upgraded its materials logistics by installing two tower storage systems and a bandsaw from Kasto.

Dominic Felice, a director of Mechtop, says: “We mainly manufacture small and very small batches down to one-offs. This is often the case when we need spare parts urgently, for instance. To meet these demands, we require systems that are versatile enough to deal with a range of processes, including our internal logistics.”

The company processes sheet metal as well as long stock including bar, tube and profile. In the past, both of these raw material types were stored in manually operated cantilever storage facilities.

Mechtop therefore decided to modernise and automate its storage infrastructure. The company opted for a compact KASTOecostore and a UNITOWER tower storage system, both manufactured by Kasto. UNITOWER is equipped with 108 storage cassettes for holding long stock up to 6 m in length, while the KASTOecostore has 26 pallet storage shelves able to accommodate sheet material up to 3 x 1.5 m.

“Automatic storage offers us a range of advantages,” states Felice. “We’ve gained a lot of valuable space, a better overview of our inventory and more control over stock, so we can work more productively and efficiently.”

Mechtop has also invested in a KASTOmicut A 2.6 automatic bandsaw. With a cutting range of up to 260 mm diameter and infinitely adjustable mitre angles from -45 to +60°, the pivot-bow bandsaw offers enough scope to cut a wide range of different components.

For further information
www.kasto.com

MTC welcomes latest member

A European start-up in metal additive manufacturing systems has become the latest member of the Manufacturing Technology Centre in Coventry. AIM3D, a university spin-off company based in Rostock in Germany, is a specialist in 3D printing systems and has developed equipment for the low-cost production of various metal parts. The company’s equipment handles a range of materials, such as stainless steel, hard metals and non-ferrous metals. As part of its membership, AIM3D is installing its ExAM 255 additive manufacturing system at the MTC, which will be the only system of its kind in the UK.

For further information
www.the-mtc.org

Ceratizit opens technical centre at AMP

On 12 October Ceratizit will open its new 3600 sq ft technical centre on Sheffield’s AMP. A total of eight machines will be operational, including an XYZ UMC-5X five-axis machining centre, a Mazak Integrex I250H multi-tasking machine and a Star SR-20JIIB sliding-head lathe. All machines will be available for demonstrations of Ceratizit’s tooling and work-holding systems. Also, the applications team will be able to take customer components from drawing to finished part, with the entire process optimised for maximum productivity.

For further information www.ceratizit.com

Burr-free, clean, high-precision surfaces

Preparations are running at full bore for the fourth edition of DeburringEXPO as a live in-person event at the Karlsruhe Exhibition Centre in Germany on 12-14 October. There is no substitute for personal contact and the real presentation of products and solutions at a specialised trade show. Face-to-face discussions with customers and trade visitors create trust when initiating business and make product presentations tangible.

Exhibitors at DeburringEXPO are therefore already looking forward to holding the trade fair for deburring technologies and precision surface finishing as an in-person event. With good reason, because around 94% of show visitors are involved in operational investment decisions. And with a rising IFO Business Climate Index for Germany, which recently reached 99.2 points, the highest value since May 2019, investments are picking up again in sectors such as automotive, mechanical engineering, sensor, medical and pharmaceutical technology, tool and mould making, metalworking, aerospace, and environmental and energy technology.

Attention is focussing on solutions with which companies can meet stricter, as well as new, requirements for deburring and surface finishing quality.

“Among other factors, this requirement arises from stricter specifications for products and their surface finishing, for example due to downstream processes such as joining, coating, sealing and assembly,” reports Hartmut Herdin, managing director of fairXperts GmbH & Co KG, organiser of DeburringEXPO. “Changing production technologies and materials, such as workpieces made of material combinations, also necessitate optimised solutions for deburring, rounding and the production of precision surface finishes, as well as the cleaning of components after these processing steps.”

The exhibition will also feature an integrated three-day expert forum. Simultaneously interpreted presentations (German <> English) will provide information concerning solutions to current problems covering all exhibition segments.

For further information
www.deburring-expo.de