Posted to News on 1st Aug 2016, 00:00
Aerospace heat treatment and surface coatings
Aerospace heat treatment and hard coatings specialist, the Wallwork Group, has invested an additional £2.5 million in buildings, plant, training and research to extend and deepen services for the aerospace industry. The company has also gained more aerospace approvals for processes at all their UK sites to ensure a national service with assured quality and quick turnaround.
Capacity to produce complex components by vacuum brazing has been doubled at the Cambridge site and a new state-of the art vacuum brazing workshop has been established at Manchester. A new building at Cambridge increases the plant size by 25 percent, creating capacity for expansion of existing processes and the introduction of new services such as mechanical testing.
Advanced heat treatment services have also increased. The aluminium HT service is now firmly established and augmented by services to heat treat magnesium. Nitriding capacity has grown and can now accommodate much larger components whilst the extended range of treatments now includes low temperature nitride processing in addition to thermal techniques.
Aerospace coating services continue to advance rapidly. Nitron Flight and Nitron O, patent processes to improve engine performance and extend the life of titanium bearings respectively, continue to attract new users. A new environmentally friendly process, Nitron CA, to replace hard chrome plating (HCP) is attracting interest as deadlines near to phase out HCP because of the toxicity of the materials.
Wallwork Group continues to be the only official partner in the UK for the CemeCon range of specialist carbon (diamond) and other aerospace coatings for carbide tooling used to significantly prolong tool life in composite drilling and cutting.
