Product category:
Materials and components
News Release from: PMS Diecasting | Subject: Zinc castings
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial
Team on 24 September 2004
Rotherham diecaster makes light of
strength test
When Sheffield's award-winning Gripple group was looking for the best way to make a crucial part for its newest product, it found the answer just ten miles away in Rotherham.
When Sheffield's award-winning Gripple group was looking for the best way to make a crucial part for its newest product, it found the answer just ten miles away in Rotherham The company's Loadhog is a re-usable lid that secures a load to a pallet in a matter of seconds - a golden opportunity for industry to save some of the millions it spends every year on buying, applying and disposing of "one trip" packaging like strapping and shrink-wrap
This article was originally published on Engineeringtalk on 1 Nov 2004 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
Stainless performance for for effluent plant
Nature Environmental Solutions (NES) has recently delivered a 100,000-litre continuous biological treatment unit to a large Danish manufacturer.
Radical design for modular helmet
Sheffield-based AME Product Development Solutions has created a modular helmet for Modular Helmet Systems.
The load is held in place by straps tightened by pulling on a lever connected to a shaft, which has to withstand high torsional forces - but at the same time the lid must be light enough to be handled with ease.
For advice on the metal that would offer the best combination of lightness and strength for the shaft, Loadhog called in Hellaby-based PMS Diecasting, which it already knew as a supplier of diecast bodies for the group's world-famous Gripple fastening device.
"We were considering a special zinc alloy with a high aluminium content, but the small weight advantage that would have given us didn't justify the additional cost", says Derek Boaler, Loadhog's Research, Design and Development Manager.
Instead, the company accepted the advice of PMS's technical director Gordon Panter that a more "everyday" alloy could do what was needed - a recommendation that was vindicated by tests on the first samples, which withstood a force five times bigger than required.
"Gordon was involved throughout the design process, and we were able to canvas his views on the practicality of our latest thinking by exchanging 3D CAD files on e-mail", says Boaler.
"The final design - more substantial than we first envisaged, but using the minimum amount of metal for the strength we need - is the outcome of a lot of computer modelling combined with PMS' knowledge of what can and can't be diecast".
Panter points out that the Loadhog shaft is a good example of what can be done with zinc if you know how to use it.
"Zinc diecastings have a 'cheap and cheerful' image that doesn't do the material justice", he says.
"In this case, we're producing in just a few seconds a ready-to-use part complete with all the holes, fins and other external features", he said.
"That's amazing to someone who thinks that the only way to produce a part that strong is to start with a block of metal and machine most of it away".
• PMS Diecasting: contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Engineeringtalk email newsletter
• Engineeringtalk Home Page
Search the Pro-Talk network of sites
