THE machining and treatments centre at British Aerospace Samlesbury has just taken delivery of the first of four multi-million pound Advanced Contouring Machines as part of the Eurofighter Typhoon investment programme.

The turnkey package supplied by DS technologies of Germany will be used to carry out detail work on Eurofighter Typhoon centre fuselage frames.

The first of these machines, designed to meet specific BAe standards, will be installed by the end of August meeting an MoD payment milestone, with the following three arriving at six-month intervals.

The ACMs will greatly assist the manufacture of the centre fuselage frames by providing a combination of increased metal removal rates and higher feed rates along with reduced set-up times over existing manufacturing processes.

A unique feature of the machines is the swarf and coolant management system which enclaves swarf and coolant being pumped from all four machines to an all new central processing facility where the swarf is separated, dried and blown into sealed skips.

Coolant is filtered and pumped back into the machines.

Unlike previous machines the ACMs are very flexible as they allow different materials to be machined such as titanium and aluminium lithium.

The successful commissioning of the ACMs is the result of a four-year partnership between Samlesbury employees and the German supplier.

A number of DST employees from both Germany and the UK are now at Samlesbury installing and commissioning the first machine.

BAe's machining maintenance department has also been involved in the installation process to ensure they are familiar with the machines before they go into production.

The machine operators will be gaining full training both in the classroom and on the job before taking to the controls.

Dave Wright, manufacturing manager in machining and treatments, said: "The first ACM process has been a challenging time but we are delighted that by working in partnership with our suppliers, we are on schedule and will soon be seeing the benefits of the new machine in action."

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