Concept to component win
From Left, Andy Essom, Simone Thomas and Barry Smith, HT Brigham directors
A major contract win for an innovative new fuel cell component, worth almost £4 million, has prompted H T Brigham to recruit additional manufacturing and production staff.
The pressworker is seeking to take on an additional 15 employees, ranging from production operatives through to development engineers. The original enquiry came when the component, which is for supply into the energy generation sector, was just at the concept stage.
Design engineers at the Birmingham-based company were tasked with determining the feasibility of producing it as a high volume, fully automated pressing. If this could be achieved it would be a cost effective alternative to other more labour intensive design proposals also being considered by the customer.
The enquiry for this very specific type of pressing had been declined by several of its competitors, but H T Brigham did not pass up the opportunity. Engineers worked to prove that the presswork method of manufacture would withstand the rigors of the demanding close tolerances and specifications which the customer had set.
Using cutting edge die simulation techniques, H T Brigham could prove that pressing was a viable manufacturing option, by identifying the level and location of any stresses in material which would occur during the manufacturing process.
Technical Sales Manager, Andrew Essom said, ‘Production of this component as a pressing not only drastically reduced the unit cost of the component, but also allowed the customer to pass on this significant cost reduction into its assembly and in turn secure long-term manufacture of the assembled product to their own customer.’
Following confirmation that the component could be pressed in high volume to the required tolerances, the customer placed tooling orders and a five year rolling commitment to high volume production, helping to secure existing jobs as well as creating new ones.
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