ADVANCED MATERIAL HARDNESS TESTING

John Guest Limited: 2011 marks the 50th year in business for John Guest Limited; a significant milestone for the world’s leading manufacturer of high-quality push-fit fittings. Remaining a family owned business, West Drayton based, John Guest Ltd supply its comprehensive range of products to a wide variety of demanding industries, including the automotive, plumbing, drinks dispensing, pneumatic and fibre optic markets.

Since the early 1960s when Mr Guest opened his factory gates for the first time, the manufacturing sector has witnessed many significant changes. However, John Guest Limited remains steadfast to the founder’s principles of ensuring the delivery of the best quality products, at a cost effective price. In addition to the company’s unfaltering quality/cost philosophy, a major factor in John Guest Limited’s success is the on-going, innovative work of the company’s prolific Design and Research Department. John Guest’s busy R&D department has enabled the launch of a multitude of commercially successful products that have allowed the company to expand its offerings, not only into its traditional markets, but also into many other industrial and technical sectors.

John Guest boasts a fully integrated supply chain which originates in product and tool design and continues through to final product assembly, quality control and dispatch. Combining this efficient structure with a passion for invention and quality has enabled the company to grow to be the global leader in push-fit fittings. Consistent investment in leading edge technology over the past 50 years has not only allowed the company to expand into its now world leading position, but to also ensure that product quality is never compromised.

In addition to investments in advanced manufacturing technology, John Guest Ltd make regular purchases of state of the art quality control and material testing equipment. A case in point is the company’s recent purchase of an advanced EW-650 Hardness Tester from Bowers Metrology. With the advanced digital tester now in regular use, Colin Finch, Team Leader of the Production Engineering Inspection Department, explained the reasons behind the recent purchase; “As the quality of our output is of paramount importance, we operate a stringent quality control regime throughout all stages of manufacture, from the goods-inward raw material stage, through in-process manufacturing checks, to final inspection. In addition to the obvious dimensional and pressure checks, we pay particular attention to the quality of the raw materials used and any perceived changes that may occur in them through the course of the manufacturing process.

“As part of our continuous improvement practice, we decided to upgrade our advanced material hardness testing capability. Although we have had excellent service from our previous Bowers hardness tester, in addition to the offerings from Bowers, mindful of the possible advancements in hardness testing technology, we considered other manufacturers models in our search for a replacement. Having evaluated each of the testers that we deemed most appropriate to our needs, we found Bowers’ EW-650 Digital Rockwell Hardness Tester to be the ideal unit for our needs, and in view of the excellent service provided by our previous Bowers model, recently made the purchase. Now in regular use, the extremely accurate Bowers tester is used across a wide range of company hardness testing procedures, including the checking of materials and components that have been hardened off-site. The easy to use machine is also proving very useful for undertaking sample tests on incoming bar stock and on semi-finished products.”

Featuring a robust cast frame with a generous working space to help accommodate bulky specimens, the flexible new EW-650 is able to measure in all standard Rockwell hardness scales and provides simultaneous conversions to HV, HB and a range of other scales.

Bowers claims that the new bench tester’s long list of advanced facilities belies its low price. The unit’s impressive list of features includes a unique motorised load application system, a superior (Heidenhain) depth measuring transducer, automated measuring procedures and a high-speed preload facility.

The EW-650’s easy to use, touch-screen operating panel and user-friendly menu gives access to storage of 50 test programmes, alpha/numeric data entry, ‘online’ statistics, storage of 20,000 single hardness values, a go/no go mode, a useful built-in printer and a bi-directional USB2 connector, enabling communication with computers and SPC devices.

For more information on the EW-650 Hardness Tester, click here.

Published on June 15, 2011 10:39