Membership voice, July - August 2005
TWI is expanding - three new facilities at Great Abington and a new building in Yorkshire.
The Trevor Gooch Laboratory, recently opened at Abington, is an impressive complex of seven individual labs dedicated to environmental and mechanical testing, particularly in sweet or sour environments.
Also managed by the Metallurgy, Corrosion and Surfacing Technology group at TWI, is the new high-pressure hydrogen test facility. Initially developed for a project with the Japan Research and Development Center, the new facility can perform tensile tests in high purity hydrogen at 450 barg pressure.
A third recent development at Great Abington has been the expansion of the fatigue laboratory, with the building of a dedicated full-scale pipeline and riser testing facility. Over 1000 full-scale tests have been conducted at Abington in recent years, and the new laboratory is capable of accommodating pipes up to 30 inches in diameter, consolidating TWI's position as the world leader in this field.
Things are also happening away from Abington, with TWI operations rapidly expanding in Brazil, Iran, South East Asia and Wales. I will keep you informed of progress in future issues of Bulletin. In Yorkshire, the construction of a new TWI research centre has started on the Advanced Manufacturing Park, at Waverley. The 1750m 2 building will contain state-of-the-art friction and laser technologies, and 35 staff. The new centre will be ready towards the end of 2005.
TWI is already operating in Yorkshire from temporary premises, and the advanced technologies installed are attracting significant interest from industry. The two friction stir welding machines are unique. The first is a high force, multi axis FSW machine, one of the largest FSW machines in the world. The second FSW machine is a high precision rigid FSW machine, capable of using ceramic tools for welding steel and other hard materials.
Facilities in Yorkshire include a 7kW Yb fibre laser, a new generation of lasers that offers higher powers and greater efficiency than Nd-Yag lasers, and a Laser Direct Metal Deposition machine for rapid prototyping or accurate build up of surfaces. The unique capabilities of laser DMD are proving particularly successful in the delicate repair of high value engineering components.
Fred Delany - Head of Industrial Member Services
