In a Q&A session, EDM Zone’s technical engineering manager, Roger Wilson shares the company’s passion in being part of the aerospace manufacturing and precision engineering supply chain.
EDM Zone is a UK-based company with a large amount of experience producing high quality precision engineered parts for a variety of industries. The company uses a number of processes such as wire EDM, CNC spark erosion and CNC machining.
Q) Please provide a brief potted history of the company?
EDM Zone has been operating for ten years now, and specialises in precision engineering, specifically wire EDM. We have around 30 members of staff and thanks to year-on-year growth, we’re still expanding and investing in new machinery.
Q) Give me a feel for the size, scope and lead-times of the EDM work you do?
We take a great deal of satisfaction in offering great lead-times to our customers, and we have been able to turn around orders in just one day. Much of our EDM work involves small and very precise components being produced in large quantities, sometimes over 1,000 units. Regardless of how quickly a customer needs an order or how many units we need to produce, ensuring every piece is delivered to the highest quality is crucial.
Q) What are the types of performance demands placed on your company by today’s customers?
Our customers are always looking for us to push the boundaries of what is technically possible. We work with the customer at the design stage of a project and offer our engineering and technical guidance wherever possible as we want our customers to end up with the best possible finished product. Whenever a new customer comes to work with us, they are assigned a dedicated account manager who is there to support them and answer any questions. This goes along with our robust ERP systems to keep customers up to date.
Q) Is there a particular success story you can briefly talk about?
We recently produced a part for the aerospace industry using wire EDM, spark erosion and CNC milling. The part was technically outstanding and was within a 3µm tolerance. The customer wanted thousands of parts turned around in two weeks, and we beat the turnaround delivering the parts within the week. This saved the customer money and time.
Q) What do you feel are the most important assets of a company?
While our machines are top of the line, we pride ourselves on employing great people who can work to a really high standard while enhancing the work environment for everyone. The experience and technical abilities of our staff, and their track record of adapting to problems presented to them, always gives us confidence that we can complete even the most challenging order.
Q) How much importance are you placing on Industry 4.0/IoT/Cyber physical systems and the advent of ‘smart tools’ and adaptive machining in general?
Our ERP system is undergoing a change, which will make it the first of its kind to capture shopfloor data. It will also include a new high-tech approach to managing jobs and tracking the processes going on through the factory.
Q) What differentiates your company from the competition - why should a customer use you over your nearest rival?
We feel we offer the best combination of experience, technical and manufacturing ability along with excellent customer service and turnaround times. Also, because we have been able to expand year-on-year, our engineering capacity allows us to deliver a complete process to our customers.
Q) What kinds of EDM machine tool developments will we be seeing in the future?
The big focus area with EDM machining is speed. As machines develop, the overall EDM process will become faster and more reliable. To continue offering the best service and quality to our clients, EDM Zone is committed to continuing to invest in these new machines when they become available.
