The Energy For Nuclear And Turbine Components

EDGECAM CAD/CAM software and the JAVELIN production control system are combining to help a precision engineering company move up the supply chain in the nuclear industry.

Northamptonshire-based Turnell and Odell are currently bidding on contracts to provide a machining service to supply components for the Sellafield nuclear fuel reprocessing and decommissioning site.

 “We simply import the model into EDGECAM and apply the machining strategies. Then we run it through EDGECAM’s powerful simulator to make sure there won’t be any expensive collisions when we start cutting metal. When we’re happy that we’ll be able to machine the part exactly how we want it, we create the NC code with any chosen post processor."

Kevin Rees, Production Director

With EDGECAM programming the parts and driving their array of Haas, Bridgeport and Cincinnati CNC machines, the components are produced quickly and accurately. But Managing Director Clive Odell says the energy industry demands a lot more than a quick turnaround.

“Nuclear suppliers maintain certain standards as detailed in the Fit For Nuclear F4N accreditation, and we need to ensure that everything is completely traceable.” Which is where JAVELIN comes in.

“With improved excellence in engineering, comes the need for additional sophistication in production control. Because JAVELIN fully integrates everything we do, we can provide complete traceability, which is a massive selling point for us in the nuclear industry.”
 
They also work for the renewable energy sector, producing a range of components for large industrial wind turbines, through to smaller domestic turbines...and turn their hand to any high precision machining across a range of other industries, including food, motorsport, mining and plastics. They recently gained AS 9100 accreditation and have begun taking enquiries from the aerospace industry.

Clive Odell says the company can look ahead with confidence, especially as they develop what he calls home-spun talent through an apprenticeship scheme, having taken on Higher Level apprentices during 2015. “The average age of our milling department is in the 30s, so we have a good succession plan, and with our growing role in the aerospace industry, I believe Turnell and Odell has an exciting future.”

As well as investing in two additional Haas VF4 SS machines for high speed machining at 12,000 rpm, the company have installed a new six dual-core computer capable of running 12 x 3.5 gigahertz simultaneously; it also has a solid state hard drive, 31.9 gigabytes of RAM, and NVIDIA Quadro K4200 graphics card.
 
The company find EDGECAM’s Waveform Roughing techniques to be particularly important for manufacturing energy components. Lee Billingham, CNC Milling Supervisor, says it’s used regularly as part of their machining operation. “It generates cut paths with high feed and speed rates, and with a greater depth of cut. Before we started using Waveform we were using fast speeds, but with very shallow cuts, so to move to Waveform was extremely beneficial.”
 
Amongst those benefits: halving roughing cycles, particularly on pockets and profiles, and increasing tool life. “We cut a lot of stainless steel and titanium, and using the full flute length means the tools are lasting a lot longer.”
    
Production Director Kevin Rees says EDGECAM makes the task of machining even particularly complex features, an easy process. “This is because any shape within EDGECAM becomes simple. Even with the most demanding shapes, the only complexity is how quickly EDGECAM can process the information.

“We simply import the model into EDGECAM and apply the machining strategies. Then we run it through EDGECAM’s powerful simulator to make sure there won’t be any expensive collisions when we start cutting metal. When we’re happy that we’ll be able to machine the part exactly how we want it, we create the NC code with any chosen post processor.”

Images show Ryan Fridd programming a special manifold component for an energy saving system; and CNC Milling Supervisor Lee Billingham.

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About the Company

Name: Turnell and Odell

Business: Precision Engineering

Web: www.toengineering.co.uk

Benefits Achieved

• Makes the task of machining even particularly complex features, an easy process.
• Ensures there aren’t any expensive collisions when cutting metal.

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Comments

“We simply import the model into EDGECAM and apply the machining strategies.
Then we run it through EDGECAM’s powerful simulator to make sure there won’t
be any expensive collisions when we start cutting metal. When we’re happy
that we’ll be able to machine the part exactly how we want it, we create the NC
code with any chosen post processor.”

Lee Billingham, CNC Milling Supervisor