Industry News

Originally planned to have taken place in February, the AVALON 2021 airshow had already been rescheduled to 26-28 November as a result of COVID-19. The pandemic had required the AVALON organising team to work through many challenges in respect of the 2021 event. However, recent developments as a consequence of the COVID-19 Delta strain have highlighted that the environment has become more unpredictable. “Delivering such a highly complex, hallmark event in these challenging circumstances would involve risks of uncertainty for attendees, participants, industry and the Australian public,” said AMDA Foundation Chief Executive Ian Honnery. “Therefore, in order to minimise uncertainty and disruption to attendees and participants, the difficult decision has been taken now that AIRSHOW 2021 will not go ahead. “It is deeply disappointing for the AMDA Foundation team, our stakeholders, exhibitors, participants and patrons that this signature industry trade show and public entertainment spectacular will not proceed. But public health and safety must be paramount and responsible levels of certainty must be achieved…

The Laser Genius+ (LG+) benefits from the 30 years of expert knowledge Prima Power has gained from the supply of over 10,000 laser systems to customers worldwide. The machine developments reduce installation time, increases serviceability, and make the overall user experience the best it can be, pushing the boundaries for the manufacturing industry. Built with ease of use and ease of service in mind, the LG+ has a single structure that holds the laser source, chillers, cutting table, and electrical cabinet. Prima Power is one of the only worldwide manufacturers to develop its own electrical components, cutting head, and laser sources. It does all of this from their facilities in Italy and the USA. It is also the only system manufacturer to make its own solid-state diode fiber lasers, with power from 3kW up to 15kW. The Prima Electro subsidiary develops CNC and electrical components, along with the software to drive the machines. wThe LG+ has any customer requirement covered, with various modular automation systems and…

The industry-led research project has been awarded $118,338 by the Innovative Manufacturing Cooperative Research Centre (IMCRC) and Allegra Orthopaedics. The project will span over 12 months and is led by Swinburne’s Dr Andrew Ang and Allegra Orthopaedics’ Robert Bell. The manufacturing outcome for Allegra will be a robust coating process that manufactures a new product line of novel bioceramic coated orthopaedic implants. This unique coating can outperform the current hydroxyapatite-coated implants. It allows Allegra to develop a proprietary implant coating process that does not currently exist in the market. This project will catalyse the industry-university collaboration and establish a solid foundation for manufacturing functional bioceramic coatings for Allegra Orthopaedics. “This manufacturing system is the first of its kind in Australia and will be made available to Allegra for this project,” said Professor Christopher Berndt, SEAM Director. “It will change the way on how orthopaedic implants are coated.” Jenny Swain, CEO of Allegra Orthopaedics, added: “Together with our novel…

Australia is responsible for 74 million tonnes of waste on a yearly basis with a recycling rate of only 60%. However, as all levels of government and industry work together to implement projects and provide funding to manage waste and protect the environment, the way we approach the country’s waste crisis is constantly shifting. Outlined in the Federal Government’s 2021-22 Budget, there are a number of actions to drive a multi-million-dollar transformation of Australia’s waste and recycling industry under the National Waste Policy Action Plan, aiming to improve infrastructure, increase recycling rates, tackle food and organic waste, and support better waste management in larger sectors such as manufacturing. Returning as an in-person event at an important time in the industry, Waste Expo Australia is the country’s largest gathering of waste management and resource recovery professionals. This free-to-attend exhibition and conference will feature more than 100 leading suppliers, including Applied Machinery, Boss Attachments, Caterpillar, Garwood, HSR Southern Cross, Pact Group, KOR Equipment Solutions, Lincom Group, STG Global, Toro Waste Equipment and Tomra. With the…

“The writing was on the wall some years back that we would ultimately see a dramatic loss of our automotive business,” says Ron Miller, Managing Director of Conma Industries. “With this in mind we diversified our product range, which is now greater than ever. Whilst we have retained some automotive business our product range takes us into many different industries today such as viticulture, food, and the building trades.” Following on from the successful purchase of a Fanuc Robocut wire-cut electric discharge machine (EDM) from Okuma Australia in 2018, Conma Industries has recently invested in the latest Okuma CNC vertical machining centre. This is a positive step towards upgrading its tool room with highly accurate and advanced technologies, building a strong relationship with Okuma Australia as it moves into the future. Ben Miller from the tool room commented that the choice of the Okuma machine was a ‘no brainer’ given the…

“High-growth businesses spend more time and resources on technology,” said Gavan Ord, Senior Manager – Business Policy at CPA Australia. “Their choice of technology puts them even further ahead of their competitors. Our survey results suggest other businesses may improve their growth prospects by investing in the technologies used by high growth businesses.” CPA Australia surveyed 725 professionals in different industries in Australia, mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia and Singapore. Respondents were asked about their businesses’ past and expected technology use and past and expected financial performance. “COVID-19 accelerated technology adoption by businesses, but not all businesses were equally placed when the pandemic hit,” Ord added. “High-growth businesses had already embraced technology enthusiastically. This helped them manage the disruption caused by COVID-19.” In 2020, high-growth businesses were significantly more likely to develop a long-term technology strategy, work with technology companies and increase their recruitment of technology staff than businesses whose growth was stagnant or shrank. “High growth businesses have been focusing on…

SEMMA is a peak industry group based in Dandenong South, Victoria, representing manufacturers located in Melbourne’s southeast region. The short course will equip participants to perform the work of “Class 2 Welders” – sufficient to meet over an estimated 70% of welding tasks required by manufacturers in south-east Melbourne. “As anyone who has operated in the engineering/sheet metal sector understands, Australian industry has suffered a severe shortage of suitably trained and skilled welders for more than 25 years,” said SEMMA CEO Vonda Fenwick. “The reality of Australia’s construction led COVID recovery and the increased defence focus over the coming years will increase demand for skilled welders exponentially.” The four-week course will help place job seekers into full-time, stable, long-term careers, while simultaneously addressing the urgent skill needs of manufacturers. Target participants include youth, female and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) cohorts, as well as individuals whose previous employment was impacted by COVID-19. The program aims to…

Open IIoT is an initiative founded with the mission of delivering valuable, efficient and easy-to-understand information on Industry 4.0, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and other related topics to end-users and the broader manufacturing industry. Its membership includes some of Australia’s most prominent automation brands, including SMC Corporation, Beckhoff Automation, NORD DRIVESYSTEMS, Balluff and ZI-Argus. With the tagline ‘Industrial intelligence 4.0 beyond automation’, KUKA is a natural fit to join Open IIoT. Since its founding over a century ago, the company has stood for ideas and innovations, bringing industrial robotics solutions to more than 40 countries. In addition to being a leading supplier of automotive production systems, KUKA has established itself as a trailblazer in e-commerce, electronics, energy, consumer goods, metal, plastics, healthcare and the entertainment industry. Cameron Fisher, General Manager at KUKA Robotics Australia believes that the company’s vision aligns closely to that of the Open IIoT group: “For over 120 years, KUKA has stood for ideas and innovation. Joining IIoT gives us the opportunity to join fellow prominent brands in promoting the latest technical advances in smart…

Every manufactured product you can think of, from the coffee you have first thing in the morning and the cornflakes you eat for breakfast, to the computer you use at work, the train home in the evening and the car waiting at the station, and even to the couch you sit on to watch your television with a glass of wine – they are all made by machines that were made by machine tools. Think about that ... just the coffee beans alone require a coffee bean harvester, washing and screening equipment, dry processing, roasting, hulling, polishing, sorting and grading processes. Each one of these processes requires equipment that has significant machining and fabrication work to produce it. And that’s just the coffee beans. So if you have your coffee with milk and sugar, multiply all those processes by three and then include the machine that you have sitting in your kitchen that now allows you to push a button and the coffee is produced. Whilst we may take making a…

While Beihang University’s research highlights “the strong relationship among maintenance strategy, production planning and quality”, Sandvik Coromant is seeing a growing trend where machine tool manufacturers are incorporating process monitoring systems within modern CNC machines. The recent Digital Factories 2020 report by Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC) recommends that “Companies must make smarter decisions using predictive analytics and machine learning”, while 98% of manufacturers surveyed in the report said they expect to increase their efficiency through use of predictive maintenance. Meanwhile, the global production monitoring market is expected to grow from $4.0bn in 2018 to $6.4bn by 2023, at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.8%, according to Markets and Markets. In line with these trends, predictability has also become increasingly important in the modern turning of steel components.…

Georges Sara began his professional life as a dental technician, but from the very start he was interested in finding ways to use new technologies and innovations in order to improve dentistry by making life easier and the outcomes better, for dentists and for patients. In 1991 he saw a lecture in which it was forecast that a new generation of ceramics was set to radically transform dental practices. The technologies required hadn’t quite matured at that point, but Georges kept the information in the back of his head, and gradually he began formulating a plan: to revolutionise dentistry through the use of state-of-the-art milling technology, CAD-CAM software and advanced materials. By 1999, Georges was ready to take the first step in bringing his plan to fruition. He acquired his first CNC milling machine and got to work researching how the technology could be used to produce crowns, bridges and other restorations for dental implants, using the…

As fossil fuels are replaced by renewable energy sources, utilities face the ongoing challenge of storing huge amounts of dispatchable energy to meet demand in off-peak or high-demand scenarios. MGA Thermal’s solution enables conversion of existing infrastructure, including coal-fired power plants, into grid-scale energy storage or creation of new supplementary infrastructure alongside solar and wind farms to provide continuous, dispatchable energy when the sun doesn’t shine or the wind doesn’t blow. MGA Thermal is built on breakthrough Miscibility Gaps Alloy (MGA) technology, extraordinary shoebox-sized blocks that are capable of receiving energy generated by renewables, storing it cheaply and safely as thermal energy, then using it to run steam turbines at thermal power stations instead of burning coal. The blocks, which can be stacked like building blocks or bricks, are able to store millions of kilowatt-hours of energy, in a cheaper, safer, and longer-lasting way compared to other dispatchable solutions. A stack of 1000 blocks — about the size of a small car — is enough energy stored to power 27 homes for…

Dr Barnes is a qualified mechanical engineer, PhD holder and STEM (Science, Technology, Mathematics and Engineering) advocate who presents on engineering topics concerning clean and renewable energy. Via her own YouTube channel ‘Engineering with Rosie’, Dr Barnes’s aim is to better educate people on the opportunities and impact of sound engineering on manufacturing. “There is nothing more satisfying to me as seeing a good idea turn into a good physical product,” said Barnes. “I aim to show my audience how engineering works, what kinds of problems exist and how STEM can address these challenges. My hope is that my audience gets better at thinking like an engineer and develops informed opinions about how technologies are likely to develop and assist us. The seven-part module provides an overview of manufacturing opportunities in Australia and details the six National Manufacturing Priorities. The self-guided ‘Manufacturing with Rosie’ module covers the topics of: the State of Australian Manufacturing; Space; Defence; Clean Energy & Recycling; Critical Minerals and Processing Technology; Food & Beverage;…