Dyn-Metal is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of premium bronze bearings. These offer better wear resistance than standard bearings, so they command a premium price. Managing director Steve Capper says: “Our bronze is a premium product — generally more expensive than standard bronze — but the machine shop helps us drive cost out of the manufacturing process and thereby remain very competitive.”
A special process developed by Dyn-Metal imparts wear rates typically two- to three-times lower than those obtained with materials of the same nominal composition under conditions of sparse lubrication and high loads. “Our range of alloys is very different from other bronzes with the same chemical composition. Although the mechanical properties may be the same, the resistance to wear is far greater.” Dyn-Metal’s range of alloys has taken the company into the front rank of bearing manufacturers across the world. Indeed, its claims to bearing longevity have been verified by various independent institutions over the 75 years the company has been in business. The alloys serve a wide range of applications, from automotive manufacturing through to quarrying, ports, steel mills, nuclear power and ship-building.
Harsh conditions
Typical applications include bearings for heavy earth-moving equipment and printing presses; Dyn-Metal also supplies specialist graphite-impregnated bearings for flood control barriers and lock gates — and slides for food-processing machinery. “We specialise in bearings for applications in harsh conditions that need the benefit of our alloys for a long working life and minimal maintenance requirements, such as our graphite-impregnated bearings,” says Steve Capper. “With the lock gates, for example, our bearings will stay under water for 20 or more years.” Crucially, Dyn-Metal has its own foundry, which casts the bronze prior to machining. “This is a complete solution, from foundry through to finish machining. We can make any size of casting, but we typically work in the diameter range 150-600mm.”
The machine shop is where the value is added to the process — by 14 CNC machines and 10 operators. “We do have customers that want to do their own finishing, but we generally provide an end-to-end solution. What’s more, we don’t sub-contract any finish machining; with the quality of machines we have, we get better machining in-house.” Central to the success of Dyn-Metal’s machine shop has been the company’s relationship with Worcester-based Yamazaki Mazak UK Ltd
(www.mazak.eu). Steve Capper’s brother Jimmy, who is in charge of the machine shop, says: “We bought our first Mazak in 1986; within six months, we had bought another. Over the last 20 years, we have bought a new machine every year. There is a constant process of upgrading going on. We’ve sold good machines that had plenty of life left in them in order to get the latest improved models.”
Increased capability
The company now owns nine Mazaks, including a VTC 800/30 SR which is being used on components from 10mm to 3m long — in quantities that range from one-offs to batches of thousands. Jimmy Capper says: “With the VTC, we have effectively replaced four machines with one Mazak; it is an incredibly versatile machine. With its fourth- and fifth-axis capability, we can use it as a big horizontal; we can also machine longer components, such as wear slides for tunneling machines, using it as a vertical machine. As Mazak has grown its portfolio of machines, we as a company have grown with them, continually pushing to get a bigger size of bed, increase our capabilities and reduce lead times for customers.”
Dyn-Metal has recently taken delivery of two new Mazak machines, both of which are replacing older machinery. “The VariAxis 630-5X II T will take out a bottleneck in our machining area where more-complicated jobs were often held up,” says Jimmy Capper. “The turning and five-axis capability allows us to complete complex jobs on the one machine; this was not possible with our existing big lathe.” The company has also bought a Quick Turn Nexus 450-II M featuring a 2m bed. “We are replacing an older lathe with the Nexus, which will fill a gap in our machining capabilities and reduce lead times. This is very important because, when we are quoting jobs, our bronze is sometimes more expensive than the standard, but the machine shop can make us more competitive. We get a lot of feedback from customers saying that we are offering a good price. That is down to the right machine shop and right calibre of machines.”