Tours of the facilities will show a wide range of state-of-the-art manufacturing systems currently accessible to industry. These include high-precision machining centres (±0.5 micron accuracy), ultra-high precision metrology systems (0.25 micron uncertainty), reconfigurable/flexible assembly cells and other advanced manufacturing systems (including a Focused Ion Beam system with a 4 nanometre resolution).

The launch is particularly relevant to those involved in product design, prototyping and manufacturing from the aerospace, automotive, motorsport and medical device sectors.

The venue for the launch is Room C25 in the Coates Building at the University of Nottingham. To register for a place please contact Rachel Watson on 0115 9513743 or email rachel.watson@nottingham.ac.uk.

The facility allows for new high precision high cost products to be prototyped and piloted through the complete lifecycle including product design, fabrication, testing and validation”.

The centre is supported by world leading manufacturers of high precision production equipment including Battenfeld (Austria), Kern (Germany), Carl Zeiss (Germany), Beckhoff Automation (Germany), Feintool Automation (Switzerland), Hitachi (Japan) and others.

For example, the new Kern Evo high precision machining centre is extremely accurate — capable of drilling holes in parts as small as a human hair. And one of the most accurate micro-injection moulding machines from Battenfeld can produce moulded parts smaller than the head of a safety match.

But the centre's main strength lies in the complete service it offers to industry — from design to manufacture and validation of new high complexity micro-products.

“It is often difficult for companies and in particular SMEs to sustain investment in the latest technologies and equipment, whilst some larger companies prefer business models based on outsourcing R&D rather than maintaining specialised equipment with relatively low utilisation,” said Professor Svetan Ratchev, Precision Manufacturing Centre Director.