Pre-Met tools up with £150,000 wire erosion investment

Pre-Met’s Neil Taylor, who has worked in the toolroom for 20 years

Redditch-based Pre-Met, is channelling more than £150,000 into extending its in-house toolroom as it explores significant new contracts in transport and defence. The metal pressing and stamping specialist has rubber-stamped investment into another AgieCharmilles wire erosion machine to broaden its capacity and provide the capability to produce larger tools and achieve more precise cuts.

Expansion comes just a few months after the completion of a £500,000 investment drive at its Studley Road factory in Redditch, which supported the successful integration of Quality Springs & Pressings into the site and business.

Toolroom Manager Matt Harrison (pictured left), who recently celebrated 20 years of service at the firm, said: “I like to think of our toolroom as the heartbeat of the business and it is arguably one of the most experienced in our sector. This latest investment will deepen the equipment available in this critical department, delivering faster turnround times, greater control on complex tooling builds and, importantly, the opportunity for us to undertake more development to do more of our own tooling. “

He continued: “The latter is really important, as we are beginning to see enquiries come in from the defence, construction and transport sectors that require us to be involved in the design stage, from early concept onwards. Our wire erosion machine will dovetail into our existing toolroom, alongside other existing machines and perfectly complements existing soft machining, surface grinding and cylindrical grinding equipment, as well as wire and spark erosion and fast-hole burning.”

Pre-Met is striving for a renaissance in the craft of toolmaking, recently taking on a tool maker and currently hiring for a new tooling design engineer to boost its skilled workforce. As the business expands, the toolroom team remains key to supporting and maintaining production effectiveness and provides the platform for the business to reinforce its established service of press tool manufacture, refurbishment and adaption/upgrade, from design through to finished trials and into production.

Sense of excitement
James Leng, managing director of Pre-Met, added: “The additional equipment and team growth has been driven by us winning new contracts. This drove the need for additional capacity to service and maintain over 500 active press/stamping tools that are used for client contracts, alongside a further 100 used to produce our own standard product range of fasteners and fixings. There is a real sense of excitement in the toolroom and I know everyone is looking forward to seeing where the business goes from here.”

Operating from Redditch since 1973, Pre-Met originally made high-value pens, cufflinks and telecommunication parts, with today’s company evolving into a critical, quality-assured supplier to aerospace, mobility, medtech, construction, electrical and transport sectors, shipping its components to customers across the world.

Consistent investment in new technology and workforce development has seen it become a metal pressings and assembly specialist, offering a full product lifecycle from concept and design to prototyping and low, medium and high-volume production.

It has recently passed all the criteria and compliance checks required to be listed on JOSCAR (Joint Supply Chain Accreditation Register), a global best practice supplier portal used by thousands of major OEMs, tier1s and supply chain companies around the UK and Europe.