A £1.5 million Klingelnberg spiral bevel grinder installed recently at Ricardo’s Midlands Technical Centre in Leamington Spa is now producing parts for the company’s current range of motor-sport and sports car transmissions, while simultaneously supporting the development of its next-generation product range.
In addition, the company has acquired new design and quality assurance capabilities through software upgrades, including the KIMOS (Klingelnberg Integrated Manufacturing of Spiral Bevel Gears) software package from Oerlikon.
Martin Starkey, managing director of Ricardo Performance Products (
www.ricardo.com), said: “The investment in manufacturing technology and software — including the purchase of the Klingelnberg grinding machine — has enhanced Ricardo’s capability to design, analyse, manufacture and inspect bevel gears with a closed-loop system.
"This willingness to invest underlines our commitment to digital manufacturing development, and the new technology is a key enabler in supporting our customers with more-advanced solutions, so they can look forward to even higher standards of product quality and shorter lead times.”
Dick Elsy, CEO of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult, who recently toured the Midlands Technical Centre to see the new equipment in action, said: “It’s great to see Ricardo at the forefront of digital manufacturing, with investment in adaptive machining.
“Its new ‘state of the art’ spiral bevel grinder is already delivering great results in terms of process capability and productivity improvements; I was very impressed.”