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March 2007Cti ChairmanBrian Higgins of Vanguard Foundry Ltd has retired as Chairman of Cti following 5 years of unstinting efforts onbehalf of the organisation and its Members. Brian committed a considerable amount of time to ensuring that thedecisions of Council were implemented fully and effectively. During his term of office, he oversaw growth of 60% inthe organisation’s income from £4,953k in 2001/2 to £7,900k in 2006/7, ensuring that Cti maintained its global preeminencein the development of casting technology, materials, products and markets, and services to Members.The organisation’s new headquarters on the Advanced Manufacturing Park in South Yorkshire crystallises theachievements of Brian’s tenure, and that a project of such magnitude can be accomplished so successfully istestament to his able stewardship.Tom Westley, Chairman and co-owner of Westley Group Ltd replaces Brian. Tom has been a Member of Councilsince 1998. He was educated at Dudley Grammar School and Imperial College, University of London, where hegraduated as a metallurgist in 1973. He worked at a copper mine in Zambia before returning to join the familybusiness. This has grown to a substantial foundry group, with a turnover of around £20m, through organic growthand acquisition aimed at consolidation in the static and centrifugal casting of copper-based alloys in the UK.Changes to CouncilAt the Annual General Meeting in September 2006 three new members of Council were appointed: Ian Gerard ofSheffield Forgemasters International Group; Olivier Bluche of Saint-Gobain Pipelines; and Danie Slabbert of SteloyCastings.Ian Gerard is a Chartered Accountant who worked in the profession before gaining wide experience in a variety offinance roles in manufacturing industry. He joined William Cook group in 1990 and over 13 years he worked asFinance Director, a Managing Director, and Environmental/Energy Director within the group, managing foundryoperations with an output of more than 350 tonnes per week.After a period working as an advisor with Business Link South Yorkshire, in 2006 Ian joined start-up companyVulcan SFM, part of the Sheffield Forgemasters International Group, as Chief Executive, with a remit to grow thebusiness on the back of SFI’s acknowledged expertise in off-shore casting manufacture and develop business innew markets such as wind turbines, project management, and engineering services and procurement.Olivier Bluche graduated from the Ecole Nationale d'Arts et Metiers, Paris. He joined the Pipe Division of Saint-Gobain in 1984 and worked in a variety of engineering and manufacturing roles in one of the French plantsbefore joining in 1990 the UK operations of Saint-Gobain (known then as Stanton plc ). Saint-Gobain Pipelinesdevelop, manufacture and supply complete ductile iron solutions for the water industries and other utilities such aspipes, fittings, valves and access cover and gratings. Over the past 17 years, Olivier has held operational roles inall the plants of Saint-Gobain Pipelines and has been Operations Director since June 2005.During these 17 years, Olivier has been closely associated with the development of the Lost Foam process,acquisition of foundries, significant investment in productivity and process as well as restructuring the foundries.Danie Slabbert is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Steloy Castings (Pty) Ltd, South Africa, three foundriesproducing static castings and centrifugally spun tube for the pump and valve, petrochemical, pulp and paper, steeland cement sectors. After working as a trainee engineer at Iscor, a major steelworks company in South Africa, hejoined an Industrial Engineering Consulting company before establishing Steloy Castings as a co-founder in 1984.He is a member of the South African Institute of Industrial Engineers and a Professional Engineer.Research CommitteeIan Furniss, Managing Director of the South Yorkshire specialist steel casting producer Furniss and White(Foundries) Ltd, has been appointed Chairman of Cti’s Research Committee. Ian has worked in the casting sectorfor over 20 years since gaining a BSc in Metallurgy at Sheffield Polytechnic in 1987. He has had experience in allareas of casting production – including melting of stainless steels and nickel base alloys, non-destructive testingand chemical analysis techniques. He has held the position of Quality Assurance Manager, Works Director andmore recently Managing Director of the family business.Copyright © 2007. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this document, in whole or in part, is strictly prohibited without thewritten permission of Castings Technology International.Page 2
March 2007He takes over the Chairmanship from Malcolm Macnaughtan of Precision Disc Castings Ltd. Malcolm has ablyand enthusiastically steered the activities of the Research Committee for three years. We are very grateful for histime and unstinting efforts on behalf of all Members and the Cti staff with whom he worked so closely.Titanium Castings (UK) LtdTitanium Castings (UK) Ltd was established on the 7 th August, 2006, as a wholly-owned subsidiary company of Cti,operating currently within the new facilities on the Advanced Manufacturing Park in South Yorkshire. The companyoperates independently, with its own Board of Directors: Richard Newby (Chairman) of Newby Foundries Ltd, TomWestley of Westley Ltd, Ian Furniss of Furniss & White (Foundries) Ltd, Anthony Village of Noel Village (SteelFounder) Ltd, Mike Ashton (Managing Director), Steve Oxley (Operations Director) and Barry Jackson (CompanySecretary). There is no indigenous manufacturer of titanium castings and the company has been set up to meetstrategic development needs in the UK, particularly in the defence sector where local supply is essential to protectintellectual property and security.New MembersWe have received applications for membership from: Carpenter Certech (UK); Sri Akila Castings (India); T3 EnergyServices (USA) and Tycon Alloys (China).Service Activity During November and DecemberIn the past 5 years, the number of direct, external metallurgical enquiries handled by the laboratory each year hasmore than doubled, while an increase in the complexity of the enquiries has led to a fourfold increase in activitylevel. Tim Gould, a Forensic Engineering graduate of Sheffield Hallam University has joined the team now headedup by Giles German, an Honours Graduate in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Liverpool.Matt Cawood, the former manager of the laboratory and an honours graduate in Metallurgy from the University ofManchester has taken over responsibility for all vacuum melting developments and operations.During November and December:• 17 metallurgical enquiries were received from 15 Member companies relating principally to physical propertiesand identification of defects in iron, aluminium and steel castings. Work was also carried out on differentmoulding materials for 2 Member foundries.• 195 visitors were received, of which 54 were Members• 68 enquiries, 17 of which were from Overseas Members, were handled by Information Services• 16 surveys for occupational hygiene were conducted for 10 Members and 20 surveys for emissions conductedfor 12 Members• 20 new castings and 21 methods (gating and feeding systems) were designed for Members all over the world• 6 QuickCast ® Stereolithography models and 10 ‘printed’ sand moulds and cores were made for Members toproduce prototypes or small volumes of investment or precision sand castings respectively• Prototype castings were made for Members from 128 QuickCast ® Stereolithography models, 53 ‘printed’ sandmoulds and cores, 31 machined polystyrene patterns and 4 very large Patternless ® sand moulds• More than 70 visits were made to Members in the UK and overseas.Visit CampaignA concerted effort is underway to visit Members to understand their changing needs and to show what benefits Ctican bring to them, especially by assisting them with the development of new products and markets. In the lastcouple of months or so of 2006, visits were made to more than half the UK casting manufacturers in membership.It became evident that, while Members are using our traditional services to a greater extent, we have tocommunicate better how new services can help to improve their business. We propose to do this by holding OpenDays at which we will demonstrate how the capital facilities at the AMP can be exploited to provide a competitiveedge; by holding seminars and workshops on relevant subjects; and through e-News and the web-site, with CaseStudies illustrating how some Members are making very effective use of our capabilities.Copyright © 2007. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this document, in whole or in part, is strictly prohibited without thewritten permission of Castings Technology International.Page 3
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