July 14, 2017
From laying underwater cables and pipes to offshore oil and gas exploration, modern subsea operations involve some of the most complex systems, constantly challenged by changing ocean environments. Driven by government regulations and market pressure to control oil production and maintain environmentally friendly practices, subsea equipment manufacturers are actively looking for solutions to reduce development and operation costs. i-Tech is one of the leading global providers of remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) and intervention tooling solutions for offshore engineering. It operates one of the world’s largest and most advanced fleets of ROVs to support major global energy companies in many flagship projects in the depths of the ocean. Pipeline engineers and designers at i-Tech are confronted with problems caused by underwater pressure, unpredictable weather conditions and strong ocean currents in their deep-water operations. Equipment reliability is of the utmost importance to ensure that tools can be used for extended periods of time with minimal corrosion and damage. To optimise the design, performance and application of its Chemical Stick Injection Tool (CSIT), i-Tech turned to 3D…
July 14, 2017
On 11 July AstraZeneca announced its decision to invest a further $100m in its manufacturing operation in Sydney, which will fund the three specialised production lines for innovative respiratory medicines. The expanded manufacturing capacity will boost international exports from the North Ryde site to over $2.4bn over the next four years, and result in an additional 60 jobs at the facility. The machinery is a result of AstraZeneca’s strong collaboration with ADDE. The Melbourne-based specialist machine designers will build each new production line from scratch to AstraZeneca’s custom design specification. The machines will take a team of 36 people over 12 months to produce. Each production line has the capacity to produce over 70 million units per year of Pulmicort Respules, a medicine for patients with asthma. The medicine is produced in Australia for markets such as China, where we help to treat a proportion of China’s estimated 30 million asthma sufferers. Pascal Soriot, Chief Executive Officer of AstraZeneca, said: “AstraZeneca has a 60-year history in…
July 14, 2017
For us at Integra Systems, synchronicity was achieved when we hit on the concept of new range of sit-stand office desks, which developed into the WorkSmart Collection of BioSmart and AeroSmart workstation solutions. Fourteen prototypes and a lot of mental and physical muscle later, we’ve got a story to tell about how our company transitioned from creating innovative products for other businesses, to devising our own intellectual property under the subsidiary company Integra TransForm. We were familiar with the sit-stand workplace trend sweeping the globe – we’d been asked to produce an industrial sit-stand solution for a client’s assembly line, using Linak actuators, which we consider to be the best available. From a technical point of view, we already understood how the actuators worked, giving us a leg-up to create a new kind of desk in our own unique vision. But that wasn’t…
July 7, 2017
Me3D was founded in late 2013 and originally it was just three old university friends tinkering in the garage. We were trying to figure out how to show everyone the incredible possibilities of 3D printing. Me3D set out with the goal of designing the world’s best educational 3D printer, the Me2. Today, we have launched a ground-breaking program, Seed3D, which helps Australian schools to ride the massive wave of growth in 3D printing and we are going to make sure this technology ends up in the hands of every kid, as early as possible. We are quickly expanding throughout the school networks – we’re already in more than 200 schools and have reached more than 120,000 students and you’ll find our printers all across the world. We’re establishing an exceptional reputation for being an inspiring company, and I credit being in Wollongong as integral to the…
July 7, 2017
As one of Australia’s longest-established manufacturing businesses, Sutton Tools is no stranger to being recognised for its achievements. The latest of these are the company’s induction to the prestigious 2017 Victorian Manufacturing Hall of Fame, and the 2017 “Manufacturer of The Year: Large Business” award. The awards were presented recently at the Manufacturing Hall of Fame 2017 Gala Dinner and Awards Ceremony, held in Melbourne on 9 May by Business Victoria. The theme of ‘Growing Advanced Manufacturing’ recognised outstanding achievements by Victorian businesses and individuals who uphold a high standard of excellence in Victorian manufacturing. “The awards were unexpected,” said Sutton Tools’ Managing Director Peter Sutton. “We were incredibly proud and honoured to receive them on behalf of every Sutton Tools staff member who has contributed so much to our successes of today.” A century of manufacturing achievement William Henry Sutton’s journey of entrepreneurial enterprise is typical of many skilled early Australian immigrants. Moreover, he achieved success while maintaining family management of a business that has grown and…
July 7, 2017
Importantly, the large machinery & equipment sub-sector increased by 0.2 points to 60.1 in June – its highest monthly result since the current sub-index commenced in 2009 (all sub-sector indexes are reported in trend terms). As in the previous two months, seven of the eight manufacturing sub-sectors expanded strongly, with all but the textiles, clothing, furniture & other manufacturing sub-sector (down a further 4.7 points to an historic low of 29.2) exceeding 54 points. “The manufacturing sector closed the financial year by extending its unbroken expansionary run to nine months,” said Ai Group Chief Executive Innes Willox. “Sales, exports and production all lifted and growth was widespread across the sector. Higher activity in the metal products; machinery & equipment; petroleum, coal, chemical & rubber products; and non-metallic mineral products sub-sectors augmented the further growth of the large food & beverages sub-sector.” Five of the seven activity sub-indexes in the Australian PMI expanded in June, with new orders strengthening (up 1.4 points to 59.5) as…
July 7, 2017
Each of the hydraulic rams (Y1 and Y2 axis) are synchronised via the CNC controller to allow for absolute precise delivery of pressure for your bending job – regardless of where you are bending across the bed. Bending performance will be equally as good at either end of the bed, as it will be for dead centre, allowing for tooling setups along the bed for more efficient processing of any multi-bend, multi-angle work. Another advantage of a CNC press brake is their extreme accuracy in terms of delivery of bending force. CNC press brakes are inherently much more power efficient than the “always 100% on” force delivery from a torsion bar press brake. With the skyrocketing costs of energy in Australia, this can remove significant costs from a company’s power bills and increase its bottom line. Yawei has always supplied an entry-level CNC synchronised press brake, and Applied Machinery has been providing Yawei’s PBH series of high-level…
July 7, 2017
The quest for reducing levels of power consumption in the global metal cutting sector is not a new trend; today it has become an essential technical requirement. Industry’s greater understanding of its environmental protection and sustainability responsibilities has ensured the development of processes, materials and machines that significantly reduce power consumption during machining operations. In addition to ensuring more efficient machining strategies, when compared to their heavy-duty predecessors, modern machining centres require less power while delivering improved performance capabilities. Previously, a typical production process was divided into primary and final cutting tasks that were performed on two machines. The first powerful machine removed most of the stock, and a more precise procedure was then used to achieve the final required shape and to create the necessary surface finish. Today, a single process often achieves these results in half the time.…
June 30, 2017
Avtech manufactures precision components and tools for companies that supply the subsea, mining and resources industries. It also produces parts for local and international manufacturers of CNC machinery, and for industrial safety switch component businesses. Nonetheless, according to Avtech’s owner and Managing Director Steve Delfos, the extractive sector inevitably casts a major influence on local manufacturing. “Being WA-based, most manufacturers are connected somehow to the mining industry,” he says. “Avtech makes components for the companies that manufacture products for the mining, oil & gas industry. We produce tools to support exploration and drilling areas for mining. This includes ‘down-the-hole’ equipment and tools used in the surveying of drilled holes.” For its oil & gas industry clients, Avtech produces various traceable components for subsea, maintenance, exploration, production and recovery tools. These will end up being used worldwide by some of the largest subsea companies. “We also precision manufacture cylinders, rams, manifolds and valve blocks for the hydraulics industry and cases, standoffs, brackets, chassis and…
June 30, 2017
Thermo-plastic injection moulding is used for large-scale mass production of a wide range of mass-produced items, from plastic car parts, homewares and furniture, medical parts, electrical tool cases, toothbrushes, toys, caps, pipes and grommets – to name just a few. The processes used for injection moulding have a direct bearing on productivity and the quality of the end product. Challenges faced by moulders and mould-makers include guarding against warping, the appearance of flow lines, sink marks, the occurrence of vacuum voids, burn marks, jetting and flash and where uneven cooling occurs, thermal stresses in particular sections can reduce tool life. Any of these issues can result in losses through rejects, part-failure and recalls. However, 3D printing with metals could have a revolutionary impact on the industry, through the design and production of conformal cooling inserts. Why is conformal cooling considered such a game changer? Put simply, conformal cooling makes use of cooling lines that follow the geometry of the part including curves allowing for uniform cooling providing better product outcomes while…
June 30, 2017
The deal represents the culmination of a long and involved development program with Isuzu Company Limited (ICL) in Japan and IAL (Isuzu Australia Limited) to supply world-class genuine bull bars for Isuzu trucks for the Australian and NZ markets, with the potential to export to other Isuzu markets globally. Announcing the contract, John Kaias, Director of Abcor, said the deal was more than two years in the making and Abcor worked closely with Isuzu – the highest-selling truck manufacturer in Australia with sales representing over 25% of the total market in 2017 - to secure it. “The partnership approach was important for Isuzu and us,” said Kaias. “Our engineers worked side-by-side, including several meetings in Japan, to ensure the product design, manufacture and performance was outstanding. It was vital to integrate the bull bar performance and styling with the truck and for the final product to be endorsed by Isuzu Japan as a genuine part.” To fulfil the contract, Abcor invested heavily in new equipment at its…
June 23, 2017
According to Nital Shah, Regional Sales Manager – Southern Region at SICK, a “mixed bag” of old and new customers visited their stand and overall it was a “very good show” in terms of interest. Visitors were particularly drawn to the company’s Flexi Soft safety controllers and the range of safety laser scanners. Regarding Industry 4.0, SICK’s pitch focussed on “smart tasks” enabled by their sensors – which can process detection and measurement signals, simplifying control programs and processing elsewhere – and on getting away from Programmable Logic Controllers. “The information from the sensor will be available to the cloud or to the browser, and that’s what Industry 4.0 is all about,” said Shah. ABB’s stand featured YuMi, its contribution to the booming collaborative robot market. Adopting cobots effectively takes training as well as a little imagination, explained Paolo Maggi, Product Specialist for Robotics. It’s important to understand the strengths of humans as well as those of robots. “If you have a…
June 16, 2017
While conventional turning operations have remained largely unchanged for decades, PrimeTurning allows machine shops to complete longitudinal (forward and back), facing and profiling operations with a single tool. The methodology is based on the tool entering the component at the chuck and removing material as it travels towards the end of the component. This allows application of a small entering angle, higher lead angle and the possibility of machining with higher cutting parameters. Furthermore, conventional turning (from part-end to chuck) can be performed using the same tools. Sandvik Coromant believes some applications could see productivity increases in excess of 50% through deployment of PrimeTurning. Some of these improvements are due to the small entering angle and higher lead angle, which creates thinner, wider chips that spread the load and heat away from the nose radius. The result is both increased cutting data and extended tool life. In addition, as cutting is performed in the direction moving…
