HEAVY ENGINEERING
historical manual operations. The machine
named "Relay" by the employees will produce 80
links per hour compared to 10 to 20 links per hour
in the past using a flash butt weld manufacturing
methodology. The new equipment will be used to
complement the existing capacity, thereby
providing both economies of scale and agility to
manufacture masterlink products respectively.
In the mining steel plate sector, production has
commenced on the latest addition to Brown
McFarlane’s wide range of processing machines.
The Bystronic BySprint Pro represents a total
investment of over £4 million by the company as
it says it walks “into a new age of steel plate
processing.” Purchased in order to help Brown
McFarlane keep pace with demand, the
company’s project management services
“continue to attract increasingly large and
complex orders. The machine increases the
company’s cutting capacity allowing a better
service to be offered to its customers.”
The BySprint Pro offers a range of new
technologies that the company will now be able
to offer to customers. “Able to deliver pin point
accuracy, laser profiling has never been so
precise. This ensures that customers receive
perfect profiles to their exact bespoke needs.
With a low thermal influence, laser machining
allows a reduction in work piece contamination.
With little to no heat affected zones, this
prevents any issues with welding on possible
brittle areas. As well as being accurate and
efficient, our laser cutting is reliable and fast.
Enabling multiple cuts to be made in one
motorised process, Brown McFarlane can
produce ready to use products straight from the
laser bed. With no need for any secondary
machining, customers can receive their profiles
even quicker with our laser machine.”
Brown McFarlane says it will be able to use
this technology to offer a new range of precision
cutting services to its customers which can save
them time and money by reducing the need for
secondary operations in their works.
Castings and gearing
When it comes to making large castings, ME
Elecmetal states that foresight is of utmost
importance. “Fundamental infrastructure needs
to be put in place to safely manufacture large
castings and maintain casting integrity. Things
like crane capacity, large capacity melting
furnaces, mould capacity along with the ability to
deliver large quantities of sand, cannot be
overlooked. In addition, heat treat furnaces need
to be considered. The door size of the furnace
and the delivery mechanism have to be thought
through long before a casting is poured. If the
casting is subject to radiography acceptance
criteria, the source and the size it can handle
needs to be established.”
58 International Mining | JUNE 2017
Next comes the important part of designing
the casting to be made in the most efficient
manner. “Seemingly small items like pattern draft
to avoid excess coring need to be thought
through, minimising cost in tooling and
manufacturing. Riser location and the plumbing
to deliver molten metal to the mould need to be
designed. Today foundries depend on
sophisticated software programs, establishing
the most efficient way to deliver the metal,
paying close attention to directional solidification
to assure proper soundness.”
Critical areas of the casting need to be
determined and tests and ac