From one-off components to high-volume production, IML UK Ltd is a subcontract machining company that specialises in giving its customers exactly what they want, when they want it. With more than 25 CNC machine tools running 24/7, 365 days a year, the Weymouth-based company has invested in the latest five-axis machine tools, pallet automation technology and HyperMill CADCAM software from Open Mind Technologies.

IML director David Zollo says: “The work on the machining side of our business is predominantly aluminium, with our turning department being mainly stainless steel. We entered the CADCAM system market back in the early days and we’ve had our original system for probably around 25 years. However, things have evolved and jobs are getting more complex. The software systems have changed too.”

The company recently introduced HyperMill to run alongside its original system and is witnessing a number of notable differences.

“HyperMill is better on our complex parts, but we’re also applying it to simple components,” says Zollo.“For parts where there are endless lines of code, it’s all about the re-generation. Previously, regenerating a complex component that is millions of lines long would take forever, but with HyperMill it regenerates just the bit we need. This saves us a lot of time.”

He adds: “As a company that has two software systems, we know what we’re talking about. We can give an honest opinion of where we are with the two systems. We’re now leaning increasingly towards HyperMill when it comes to our complex parts.”

More information www.openmind-tech.com

Worcester-based A13 Engineering moved from plasma cutting to laser cutting in October 2023 with the installation of a Bodor 12kW laser profiling machine and Lantek Expert CADCAM nesting software.

Harry Hodgetts, managing director at A13 Engineering, says: “We found that high-definition plasma wasn’t suitable for about 10% of our production, driving us to invest in a laser cutter that would give higher accuracy and automatic part etching for easy component identification.”

He continues: “We were already aware of Lantek and chose it without hesitation because it met all our needs. Laser cutting allows us to handle a variety of materials and, with Lantek Expertsoftware, we can seamlessly import customer CAD files. The majority of our work is cutting mild steel between 2 and 30mm thick, and stainless steel between 1 and 10mm. The machine has a shuttle table so we can unload parts while cutting the next sheet. With Lantek’s nesting we can tag parts in the sheet and nest parts in larger holes [which would otherwise be scrap], add the odd part in a spare area, and have the flexibility to use up material remnants.”

The subcontract side of the business requires A13 Engineering to generate a large volume of quotations. Using spreadsheets previously took over 20 minutes for each quotation. In contrast, the company can generate quotes in just 5 minutes with Lantek iQuoting. The software holds material prices and allocations of material, and simulatesnesting and machining times.

“In our fast-paced industry, Lantek Expert and iQuoting have become indispensable to our business,” concludes Hodgetts.

More information www.lantek.com