A combination machine from XYZ Machine Tools has enabled subcontractor Wicks Engineering to improve productivity at its facility in Leeds. Wicks specialises in prototype work as well as repair and maintenance projects that can demand a significant amount of reverse engineering. Wicks Engineering specialises in prototype and repair and maintenance The company’s work has included film props for movies including ‘Batman Begins’ and ‘The Da Vinci Code’

Initial figures for the first quarter of 2011 indicate that the UK ran a trade surplus of £9.4 million, reports the Manufacturing Technologies Association (MTA).

It has been a long, hard decade for Canada’s mouldmakers. Offshore competition, fluctuating currency values and a recession combined to turn the industry on its head. We asked Tony Grossi, president of Garrtech Inc.

Portal machining centre manufacturer F Zimmermann GmbH, Denkendorf, Germany, which specialises in building 5-axis and 6-axis machines for producing large composite and aluminium components, has appointed Geo Kingsbury Machine Tools as its sole sales, commissioning and service agent in Britain and Ireland.

Laser cutting machine orders saw a big uptake in Canada. Image: Mazak Optonics Machining centres saw a big increase in orders. Waterject cutting machines.

Doosan distributor Mills CNC has supplied two large-capacity machine tools to FMC Technologies to machine large, heavy and high-precision critical performance annulus wing blocks (AWBs). The machines are a Doosan HM1000 (1,000mm twin-pallet horizontal machining centre) and a Doosan DBC110 (horizontal boring machine)

If you’re searching for a machine tool but aren’t sure which supplier offers the best choice for your application, then you may well have participated in the recent Joint Distributor Open House May 4 and 5 in southern Ontario. In its sixth year, the unique regional event, which now draws manufacturers from across the country, offers people the opportunity to compare machine tools from different suppliers during a two-day event. More than 500 manufacturers visited the participating suppliers—DMG Canada, Mississauga, ON; Elliott Matsuura, Oakville, ON; EMEC Machine Tools, Mississauga, ON; Ferro Technique, Mississauga, ON; and SST-Canada, Mississauga, ON.

More than 200 manufacturers, some from as far away as Alberta, came out to Mazak Corp. Canada’s Cambridge, ON, facility for the company’s Discover Mazak-Canada event

Renishaw plc has received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise 2011 in the Innovations category, the company’s fourteenth Queen’s Award since its formation in 1973, and its fifth in just eight years.

Getting the right cut is always important, and no less so for a turning application within a multi-tasking machining centre. Yet these machines present unique cutting tool challenges for turning. “There has been a lot of attention given to milling in turning centres, but turning on machining centres is innovative,” says Chuck Birkle, vice president, sales and marketing for Mazak Corp., Florence, KY (Mazak Canada is based in Cambridge, ON)