GR Contracts achieves 50-60% increase in productivity with Ficep

When GR Contracts, a supplier of structural steelwork for the construction industry, was looking to invest in new steel processing machinery to increase productivity and reduce production costs, it evaluated machines from several manufacturers.

The company chose Ficep’s Endeavour, its fastest automatic CNC line for drilling, milling and marking beam channels and flats.

GR Contracts has seen increases in productivity, mainly due to the scribing facility on the machine which has reduced the fit up time for its fabricators. Before the acquisition of the Endeavour machine fabricators usually had to mark out, mag drill and then fabricate the steel. Now they just have to fabricate the steel. The company has decided to run the machine on two shifts which means it has doubled output with the same number of staff.

Robert Savage, director of GR Contracts, said: “We have now seen between 20-30% more pieces produced on one shift compared to the previous methods. When we have moved to two shifts on the Endeavour machine we have seen a further 20-30% increase which equates to an overall 50-60% increase in productivity from the new machine. This result has far exceeded our expectations.

Ficep www.ficep.co.uk