From left: Caroline Blake, Financial Controller; Chris Heatley, CEO; The Rt Hon Nick Gibb MP; David Gratton, Managing Director; Bartlomiej Napora, Technical Director
During September 2022, we were honoured to welcome Nick Gibb, MP for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton as he visited our site in Lineside Way, Wick.
Our CEO, Chris Heatley provided Mr Gibb with a guided tour of our state-of-the-art facility, introducing him to the highly skilled engineers who drive our business forward. We also demonstrated how our advanced processes are pioneering the manufacture of complex, precision, lightweight castings for Automotive, EV, Motorsport and Defence industries.
Being a constituency member and as representative of the British manufacturing industry, we took this opportunity to discuss a wide range of key topics such as business growth, investment, local employment, skills and education.
We gave Nick Gibb an insight into the exciting long-term investments and developments we have committed to here at Finecast, to optimise our manufacturing process, drive company growth and create new career opportunities in the local community. By introducing advanced technology, we can provide increasingly complex and intricate moulds for our castings, enabling us to expand into other market sectors who have a requirement for consistent complex geometrical shapes.
Expanding Capabilities with our New Purpose-built Foundry
The tour began in our new, purpose-built foundry bay. This has been a crucial investment to meet with customer demand and increases our capacity needed for future growth.
Expanding our existing foundry has doubled our manufacturing space and enables us to create larger complex mould assemblies and castings including BiW (body in white), MLP (make-like production) as well as offering a world-class centre for prototype development.
In addition, we can now provide low volume production through to full production batch manufacture supporting our customers on each stage of the process from concept to completion.
Equipped with the latest cutting-edge foundry equipment from Omega Sinto, the World’s leading foundry plant and equipment supplier, we have created the ultimate automated moulding lines to improve production and mould consistency.
Purpose-built Foundry
The new foundry bay is fully operational and is now supporting the development and manufacture of several large defence contracts and BiW programmes.
Through company growth and the recent expansion of our manufacturing facility, we are now looking for talented people to join us at Finecast.
We are offering a range of new and exciting career opportunities for passionate, highly skilled engineers and aspiring graduates to join our specialist engineering divisions to innovate and pioneer the manufacture of highly technical complex parts.
Turbo-Charging the Future with our 3D Printing Centre
Adjacent to our purpose-built foundry is our new state-of-the-art 3D Printing Centre which will house our additive 3D printer from Voxeljet, due to arrive in January 2023.
Having an additive 3D printer in-house will enable us to rapidly produce complex moulds and cores, eliminating the need for expensive foundry tooling.
3D printing will allow us to rapidly manufacture cores in volume, and combine multiple traditional cores into one printed piece, allowing for greater repeatability, improved accuracy and the ability to cast extremely complex shapes.
Removing the need for conventional foundry tooling will further reduce our carbon footprint, due to the costly and unsustainable way polyurethane resin is recycled.
From left: David Gratton, Managing Director; Bartlomiej Napora, Technical Director
Committed to a Green Future by Investing in our Thermal Sand Reclamation Plant
We were proud to demonstrate how we have invested in new innovative technology to make our sand-casting process more efficient whilst helping us to reduce our carbon footprint and to become more mindful of the environment.
With the investment into our thermal sand reclamation plant, we can now process up to 1.5 tonnes per hour and can reclaim up to 95% of the sand processed within our foundry.
Thermally reclaiming our sand brings a range of advantages and benefits, including a significant reduction in emissions and costs by eliminating the need for regular sand deliveries to and from the foundry and preventing the need to dispose of used sand at landfill.
In addition, we can also optimise the sand quality during the thermal reclamation process, which results in exceptionally high-quality castings with superior surface finishes.
Thermal Sand Reclamation Plant
Scanning to Guarantee Excellence, Every Time
Another recent investment, which is crucial to our quality control process, is the addition of our state-of-the-art Non-destructive Testing (NDT) Centre.
The NDT Centre houses our new GE Seifert X|Cube Series 320KV, a powerful, and versatile x-ray scanning system, which provides both 2D radio tomography and 3D computed tomography inspection.
This gives us the ability to check for a range of factors when manufacturing our castings, including micro-porosity, sand inclusion, dimensional stability, sub-surface cracks, shrinkage porosity, wall thickness measurement, internal core location and reverse engineering.
Currently, we are the only foundry in the UK with this high-level NDT capability, enabling us to guarantee high-integrity castings every time.
GE Seifert X|Cube Series 320KV, Non-destructive Testing Centre
Making it a Priority to Invest in Education, Apprentiships and Local Employment
We were very proud to introduce Mr Gibb to our extraordinarily talented team, who are all incredibly passionate about their roles in producing highly technical castings and continue to innovate and pioneer the sand-casting industry.
It was important for us to discuss what we are currently doing to help with local education, employment and what more we can do to support the local community.
Investing in great people is what makes a great business! That is why we are fully committed to continued investment in local talent. We now have a team of 85 employees, of which many have grown into senior positions through our apprenticeship scheme and graduate placement recruitment.
To inspire local young people, we engage and make regular visits to schools and colleges in the Arun District and surrounding areas, introducing them to new advanced technologies and demonstrating why a career in the casting manufacturing industry is so exciting and rewarding.
Finecast Graduates and Apprentices
Furthermore, we highlighted the importance of educating young people to a higher level, especially in the latest emerging technologies within the foundry industry, including computer-aided design, virtual simulation, 3D printing, non-destructive testing, high-precision CNC machining, metallurgy and metrology.
Thank You to Nick Gibb MP
We would like to thank Nick Gibb MP for visiting us here at Finecast. It was a pleasure to discuss a range of key industry topics crucial for the future development of Finecast and the foundry industry within the United Kingdom.
Giving us the opportunity to demonstrate how we innovate and pioneer the sand-casting industry and showcasing why we are the perfect partners for complex, high-precision casting production for a range of industries, including automotive, EV, motorsport and defence.
If you would like to express your interest in having a guided tour or would like to get in touch to discuss your project objectives with our team please call us on +44 (0) 1903 716 471 or complete our contact form here.
The Finecast Team
