Precision engineering firm invests in new £100K press line

The new investment will help boost capacity ahead of a raft of new opportunities.

Source Engineering, which employs 32 people across its two divisions in Plympton, has tapped into the expertise of Bruderer UK to purchase a machine that can do the work of four conventional HME power presses.

The BSTA 200M 20 tonne stamping press was identified as the ideal solution and is now up and running at its Langage Business Park facility, achieving 300 strokes per minute which represents a 200% increase in production output across a range of products destined for the automotive, electrical wholesale and oil and gas markets.

Engineers at the firm have freed up an additional 500ft² of production space to use for the introduction of new projects and to help cope with an increase in demand for its range of automation solutions.

Andy Dunkerley, chairman at Source Engineering, commented: “Buying a Bruderer is like buying the Swiss watch of machines: you get unrivalled precision, speed and repeatable quality, all wrapped up in a relatively small footprint.

“We already had one in another part of the factory and were fully aware of its capabilities, so when it came to looking at how we optimised the factory floor space by replacing four machines with one high-speed line we called in its technical experts to review the options.”

He continued: “They really understood what we were looking to achieve in space utilisation without giving up the versatility and the volumes, which basically meant we needed one machine to do the work of four.”

The Bruderer BSTA 200M high precision, high performance stamping press was identified as the preferred option and was fitted with a high-speed Servo Feeder and Pallet Decoiler to help achieve ultimate precision control of material de-coiling and pinpoint pitch control through the progression press tool.

Specified with a tool area of 510 x 400mm, the machine can deliver up to 1800 strokes per minute and is capable of handling a maximum material thickness of up to 2mm and material width of 100mm.

Source Engineering www.s-eng.co.uk

Bruderer www.bruderer.co.uk