Take a seat in first class

Poole-based Aerotech Precision Manufacturing is rapidly becoming recognised as one of the UK's leading SME's, having established itself as a key subcontract partner to a wide range of high profile customers across the aerospace, oil and gas, military, medical and nuclear sectors.

With such a broad customer base, the components produced within the company's 43,000ft² manufacturing facility are equally diverse. These can range from simple milled or turned parts to complex high precision components and on occasions, the exotic and unusual, exemplified by the first class seating units produced by the company for a leading international airline.

Manufactured from a solid billet of aluminium, weighing in at 220kg, and 980mm x 235mm x 415mm in size, each seat is milled from the solid piece to generate the unusual shape and profile, weighing 11kg when completed. The finished machined seat is then highly polished and finally gold-plated and leather bound to give it its first class appeal.

The seats are used within the first class section upper bar area within one of the world's most modern airliners, and compliment the overall sumptuous environment.

Whilst the finished result is somewhat unusual, the seats were profile milled using Aerotech's Kiheung CNC bed mill which has a capacity of up to 3,300mm x 1,250mm x 1,650mm and is just one of a comprehensive range of CNC turning and milling systems used by the company.

Aerotech's managing director Roger Foley comments: “This project clearly demonstrates the extensive machining capability we have here within our facility. We are currently turning components from 1mm to 650mm in diameter, and with the recent acquisition of our latest bed mill, have extended our milling capacity further to accommodate large components up to 3,250 mm by1,250mm.”

“We are also committed to quality through our AS 9100 approval and continue to forge strong relationships with those clients that are equally committed to the principle requirements of the standard. Our quality system is underpinned by the powerful production control software Progress Plus which handles all aspects of the manufacturing process from material forecasts, procurement, production planning and scheduling through to subcontracting, quality control and delivery.”

Aerotech
www.aero-tech.co.uk