Forging

Our forging facilities have some of the best capabilities in the world

Our extensive forging facilities enable us to produce some of the most complex and intricate precision-forged components in the world.

Three onsite forges work with a wide range of materials including aluminium, titanium and steel alloys as well as other specialist materials. We excel at producing a wide variety of asymmetric and complex shapes while achieving the desired grain flow and mechanical properties to meet exacting customer specifications.

We have a highly-skilled team of master forgers and over 75 forging units from 150 tonnes up to 12,000 tonnes including hydraulic presses, screw presses and hammers. The DG40, a 40-tonne counter-blow hammer is one of the most powerful forging units in the UK, with an equivalent power of a 20,000-tonne hydraulic press. We can produce closed die forgings up to 250kg and hand forgings up to 800kg.

We process all the core materials forged in house and have extensive heat treatment facilities. Heat treatment is generally applied to enhance strength and improve mechanical properties to achieve customer specifications. We also have capabilities for all ancillary operations including:

  • Chemical cleaning/etching, abrasive blasting and barreling.
  • Anodising and surface treatments.
  • Destructive and non-destructive testing.

We continually invest in developing new forging technology solutions to optimise material and forging design with methods to ensure cost-effective production, using forging model simulation at the design stage. For example, we now use infra-red die heating to reduce changeover times and state of the art water-jet cutting to reduce non-value added processing.

 

 

How It Works

A billet is first cut to the right size, heated and pre-formed prior to die forging. One of our teams of master forgers then heats the dies and material simultaneously in preparation for die forging to achieve the final component shape. Minimal excess flash (necessary to ensure the component fill) is then trimmed prior to heat treatment. Each forged component may require several stages of forging to achieve complex configurations.

Follow us on Twitter

Tweets could not be loaded at this time.