Australian manufacturer conquers international motorsport with advanced cooling technology. Dr Cameron Chai talks sports
If you know anything about motorsport, you will know that Formula 1 is the pinnacle. If you manufacture performance automotive parts, you would be justified in thinking that you have made it, if your parts are on board one of the F1 cars. How impressed would you be with a company that doesn’t just supply one team, but works with the entire field? What if I was to tell you, this same company was also the primary supplier for NASCAR, MotoGP and pretty much every other high-end motorsport category, including our very own V8 Supercars? Would you be surprised to hear that such a company does exist, and they are based in Australia?
The company in question is PWR Advanced Cooling Technology, based on the Gold Coast. Originally a side business started by father and son team Kees and Paul Weel after various forays into motorsport categories, including the aforementioned V8 Supercars (or a previous incarnation thereof), they identified a need in the marketplace to design and manufacture high-performance, lightweight cooling systems to meet their exacting demands. And in 1997 Paul Weel Radiators was established and later morphed into PWR Advanced Cooling Technology.
“From humble beginnings” Kees and Paul grew the business with the mission to build world-class automotive cooling systems, always having an eye on the international market. Driven by self-belief and a can-do attitude, they experienced rapid growth. In 2006 they started construction of their state-of-the-art facility in Ormeau on the Gold Coast and have continued to expand on this location. With a focus on quality and performance PWR broke into Formula 1 in 2009 and haven’t looked back. The business now employs 350 staff in Queensland and export around 90% of their production. Through the acquisition of C&R Racing in the USA (in 2015) they now have manufacturing capabilities in North America along with another 140 staff and another manufacturing facility in Rugby, UK with 40 more staff, all sites now under the global brand of PWR Advanced Cooling Technology.
When asked why PWR has been so successful, Matthew Bryson, Chief Technical and Commercial Officer, who has been on board for the vast majority of PWR’s 26-year journey explained. “We offer our clients opportunities. Through investment in technology we remove many of the limitations that encumber others and we can provide a full solution using flexible work methods, manufacturing processes and equipment, and leverage our broad range of capabilities.”
He went further to explain, they don’t just supply standard radiators off the shelf and force them to fit an application, rather they look at the bigger picture with the process involving design, simulation, testing and proofing of the whole cooling solution. Matthew went further to say, “there isn’t a one-size fits all solution and we partner with our clients to design and build the optimal cooling system to suit their needs.”
When dealing with the upper echelons of any industry, finding performance advantages requires pushing boundaries. In the context of cooling systems in motorsport, this entails maximising cooling efficiency while minimising weight and often working with minimal space and complicated geometries, all while ensuring reliability. Add aerodynamics i.e. minimising drag and optimising downforce, and the equation gets quite complicated.
Thankfully for their clients, PWR’s manufacturing capabilities are almost limitless. Key to PWR’s ability to offer unbounded opportunities is their commitment to technology adoption. By constantly updating their capabilities they are able to offer increased levels of flexibility and options so they can manufacture solutions to suit any given application, from one-offs to large volumes.
This has resulted in PWR going well beyond just supplying radiators. They also design and manufacture oil cooling systems as well as intercoolers for turbo and supercharged engines. Furthermore, their open mindedness and willingness to explore different cooling technologies such as tube and fin coolers, bar and plate coolers, and additive manufactured coolers. Different cooling modes such as liquid-liquid, liquid-air and cold plate technology has allowed them to expand into hybrid and electric vehicles for battery cooling as well as different industries such as aerospace, defence and electronics. It has also seen them expand into micro matrix heat exchangers (MMX) which can employ tens of thousands of fluid carrying micro tubes in a single system and are a highly efficient, lightweight and compact cooling configuration for space constrained applications.
This commitment has seen PWR invest heavily in technology and equipment for production and fabrication including 50 CNC machines (3, 4 and 5-axis including self-loading and unloading systems), wire EDM, spark erosion EDM, TIG, vacuum brazing, laser welding, laser cutters and heat treatment equipment across their global sites. They have also embraced additive manufacturing. While they have had plastic 3D printers for 10 years, they have added metal 3D printers to their arsenal in 2020 providing even greater design freedom. Clean room assembly facilities round out their comprehensive list of manufacturing capabilities which all contribute to their overall capability making them self-sufficient.
In-house expertise employs CFD (computational fluid dynamics) engineers to refine their designs to meet the demands of clients like those in F1 and aerospace who require custom solutions where factors such as size, weight, geometry, efficiency are common goals within a confined space.
They are also uniquely positioned to achieve these goals with a proven solution thanks to a purpose designed wind tunnel. One of only a handful in the world, this system was designed with technical contribution from Red Bull Racing’s F1 team engineers. This allows them to run real world simulations on heat exchangers up to 1m x 1m in size and deliver air velocity and pressure equal to that seen in vehicle to determine such things as heat transfer, coolant pressure drop and airside pressure drop.
To ensure the quality of the parts they manufacture they also employ a range of tests ranging from pressure testing to dimensional and integrity checks. They use CMM (co-ordinate measuring machines) to check overall dimensions and CT (computed tomography) for internal dimensions and more complex geometries that CMM can’t access. The non-destructive, 3D imaging nature of CT is ideal for inspecting the integrity of welds and other joints as well as the geometrical accuracy of additively manufactured components. Their system is one of the largest in Australia and allows them to scan parts in the 1.2m x 0.8m range with sub-micron resolution. CT inspection forms part of the production process for high-end components and is now expected from these clients. As such their CT runs almost constantly in QC mode, but is also used to help refine new fabrication processes.
Their commitment to quality extends to their quality management system. To meet the demands of a global audience, they are certified to international standards such as AS9100 (for aerospace), IATF16949 (International Automotive Taskforce), ISO 9001 and ISO14001.
While being a household name in the automotive aftermarket industry, there are OEMs who have also sort the expertise that PWR has to offer. As has been the case in motorsport, it is the upper echelons of the auto manufacturers and hypercar producers like Porsche, Aston Martin, Pagani and Koenigsegg (to name but a few) who have called on PWR to help design and manufacture the cooling systems on their cars.
While their Ormeau facility has served them well, PWR have just announced the next stage in their evolution. They are just about to embark on another expansion that will see them move into a new $21.9m facility up the road in Stapylton. Expected to be ready in 2025 following an 18-month construction phase, the expanded facility has the potential to increase manufacturing output by 114% using new equipment. They also anticipate the expansion will add another 488 new jobs over the next 10 years, more than doubling their existing workforce. These exciting plans have attracted the support of Queensland Treasury who will contribute up to $8.78m to support the venture and keep it on the Gold Coast.
PWR are truly a one-stop shop for cooling solutions and are an Australian manufacturing success story that has made it on the world stage. Through commitment, ingenuity and investment in advanced capabilities, they have conquered motorsport and are no doubt looking to do the same in other fields such as aerospace, defence, electronics and others. If you have some spare cash, some shares in PWR might be a good investment if they continue on their current trajectory and experience the same levels of success in these new marketplaces!