Vacuum brazing capacity doubled for Tecvac at Cambridge

Citation

(2008), "Vacuum brazing capacity doubled for Tecvac at Cambridge", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 80 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/aeat.2008.12780cab.003

Vacuum brazing capacity doubled for Tecvac at Cambridge

Article Type: Aerospace technology From: Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology: An International Journal, Volume 80, Issue 3.

Tecvac Ltd, a member of the Wallwork Heat Treatment (WHT) Group reports that it has doubled vacuum brazing capacity at Cambridge with the addition of a second brazing furnace. The additional furnace, representing an investment of around £500,000, underpins the vacuum brazing service that serves aerospace.

The new furnace is allied to a precision automated cleaning line to ensure very high levels of braze integrity, and gives Tecvac additional resources to manage complex brazing tasks. Already some projects involving more than 20,000 discrete joints in a single sub-assembly have been successfully completed.

“We are seeing increased demand for high quality service in this sector,” said WHT Director Peter Carpenter. “We have invested in an additional, larger capacity furnace at Cambridge, together with support facilities at our Bury, Lancashire site. This will ensure that our customers have a completely reliable, high quality service and guaranteed fast turnaround.”

Components can be vacuum brazed using alloys of copper, nickel, gold and silver, to join similar or dissimilar metals and/or ceramics and cermets. The service covers components using alloy steels, tool steels, titanium alloys, nickel and superalloys and copper, tungsten and molybdenum alloys.

The additional furnace at Cambridge guarantees fully temperature controlled performance down to a vacuum of 10^,5mbar at temperatures above 750°C. All components and sub- assemblies can be annealed or receive other post-brazing treatments on site at Cambridge. Both vacuum brazing furnaces will accept complex assemblies up to 1,500 x 900 x 800mm, and provide high-surface quality, corrosion-free, surface finishes. This enables Tecvac to offer exceptional brazing integrity and high-quality surface finish using high-melting point brazes with the most advanced component materials. Various brazing methods, using paste, wire, shim, or tape, are available to suit production requirements.

Tecvac expects demand for the service to continue increasing. Typical applications include all types of aerospace and precision medical components, high-performance components for Formula 1, and specialist applications such as high- vacuum assemblies and heat exchangers.

Tecvac's new service is already accredited to the AS 9100 Quality System, and complements the heat treatment and NADCAP approved hard coating service. The vacuum brazing service is also available through other Wallwork Group sites in Manchester and Birmingham, with an integrated collection and delivery service covering most areas of the UK.

For further information, please contact: John Rushforth Tecvac Limited, Tel.: +44 (0) 1954 233700, Fax: +44 (0) 1954 233733, web site: www.tecvac.com