Our expertise in aluminium extrusion metallurgy, surface treatment and process improvement can supplement your in-house technical support.
If you need pilot-scale facilities to test new alloys, then we can help. Thanks to our contacts at several leading UK universities, we have access to an entire off-line aluminium extrusion process route. One of our consultants will manage your project and carry out each stage of the process himself, from billet casting through to extrusion. This means you get your results quickly. We’ll also use our product knowledge, together with a literature review, to help you select the most appropriate alloy variants.
We’ve worked in aluminium extrusion plants all over the world, from large multi-national companies to small single-site enterprises. As a result, we think we’ve got a good handle on what constitutes ‘world-class’ and we can use this knowledge to help you get better.
Your improvement journey will start with an audit. We’ll benchmark your extrusion process against operations with similar equipment. Then we’ll identify opportunities to improve productivity, yield and product quality and we’ll work with your team to prioritise and implement them.
Process improvements must be sustainable. To achieve this, everyone involved needs to understand how and why changes are being made. The best way to do this is by hands-on support at the machines. For example, if we train your team on temperature management, we will start in the classroom but continue at the press.
You can read more about our training in these case studies:
If you want to make your whole process, from billet storage through to packing, more efficient we will work with your team to analyse what you do and remove the wasteful activities. We’ll teach you how to see your process through ‘fresh eyes’ so that you’ll begin to question how and why your activities are being done the way they are.
Often manufacturing processes are carried out in the same way for many years and inefficiencies become ‘built-in’. In the same way, we can analyse your material flow to see if it can be changed so material moves around your shop floor faster.
Billet quality and extrusion plant efficiency
Evaluating toughness in aluminium extrusions: 1