NMB Minebea UK, which manufactures a variety of cold formed parts for aerospace and military, including bearings and landing gear, has installed a new hardness testing machine.
Supplied by Bowers Group, the Innovatest Falcon 507 Vickers, Knoop & Brinell Hardness Tester has enabled NMB Minebea UK Ltd to increase its Proficiency Testing Program (PTP) testing results from Class 3 to Class 1, deliver a faster turnaround of samples, and dramatically increase the accuracy of the tests carried out.
Staff had previously used an old, manual Vickers hardness tester. Despite having performed well for many years, operators found that readings were beginning to drift and were gradually moving towards being outside of the accepted range. In addition, the old hardness tester made testing a fairly slow process; it was awkward to use and difficult to train people on.
Jason Woodhouse, Laboratory Manager at NMB Minebea UK said: “Since investing in the Falcon, the accuracy of our hardness testing has improved by 60%. It’s not just accurate, it’s really simple and easy to use too.”
NMB Minebea UK carries out a variety of performance tests in its dedicated metallurgical lab. Precise and accurate hardness measurement is of the upmost importance to performance critical parts made using the cold form process. Hardness needs to be accurately measured to prevent fracture during the cold form process, which can result in components having to be scrapped, and also damage to the dies and tooling on machines.
Jason Woodhouse continued: “We chose the Falcon 507 because it offered us all the features we needed at the right price. It was the perfect balance for us. Most people in the metallurgy lab use the hardness tester anything from once a day, to several times, depending on the demands of the current project.”
Testing for aerospace companies and their supply chains must be carried out in accordance with a Proficiency Testing Program (PTP), which refer to a series of tests established by a number of aerospace firms including Airbus, Safran, GE, MTU, GKN, Airbus Helicopters and Rolls Royce in order to qualify Laboratories around the world on the basis of ISO 13528:2015 standard.
NMB Minebea UK Ltd can now test to ASTM and British Standards on the hardness tester, validate paperwork, and export all results to Microsoft Windows. To ensure the hardness tester is as accurate as it can be it is calibrated by an external company every 6 months. As part of NMB Minebea UK Ltd’s NADCAP accreditation certain specifications must be met, and daily tests are undertaken to ensure the machine is functioning accurately.
NMB Minebea UK Ltd also have some dimensional metrology equipment from Bowers Group including 3 point gauges used for bore measurements, stick micrometers and thread micrometers.
NMB Minebea UK Ltd is Nadcap Accredited and works to AS/EN 9100 Series (Aerospace), ISO 9001 (Quality Management) and ISO 14001 (Environmental Management).