Have you ever wondered what makes a product appealing? Is it the packaging, its appearance, the design or its performance that attracts attention? Perhaps, the answer lies in the combination of all the factors. In an industrial product, packaging serves to protect the product until it reaches the customer. Aesthetics connected to the packaging play a minor role whereas its strength and capacity to withstand some abuse during transportation are important. The appearance of the product most definitely attracts customers whether they are industrial users or end users. The design of the product and its performance would influence the decision to continue buying the product, once found to be suitable.
The appearance of any product primarily influences the decision to make the purchase. Investment castings are the raw materials that are required for the manufacture of many industrial products. Investment castings are known for their excellent appearance, casting soundness, fine tolerances and ability to produce intricate shapes. However, if these castings are transported over long distances without proper packing, the surfaces can develop dents. The process of investment castings is time consuming due to the long shell making period. This time can be reduced by maintaining an inventory of shells ready for pouring of metal. At Rajeev and company, we decided to set up our own investment casting foundry to address the issues which arose from outsourcing. Often, the castings would arrive late, and the surfaces would be damaged. Due to poor process management at the foundry, castings would, sometimes, leak during pressure tests. This discovery of casting rejection due to leakage, at the very last stage, would be a very frustrating experience.
We have set up a very modern, world-class investment-casting foundry, abutting our existing valve manufacturing facility. We manufacture castings which are excellent in both appearance and performance. We are maintaining an inventory of ready shells so that the time from the order of valves to delivery is minimized. New product development will benefit from our own capacity to develop dies for castings. We also have a small crucible of just 50 Kg size to produce small batches of castings for valves in exotic metals. This is a feature missing in most of the large foundries that focus on producing higher quantities of metal.
They are generally reluctant to produce smaller batch sizes of special alloys like Duplex or Super duplex stainless steels, Alloy 20, Hastelloy etc. We have set up this foundry with excess capacity to supply machined and pressure tested components to customers in other critical areas of engineering.
Every customer’s experience influences the decisions they make. Our experience with outsourcing of castings has provided us with some insights which we believe can add value to other customers’ processes. Many would agree with the statement that customers are forced to accept what is available. There are certain advantages, and some challenges associated with manufacturing in any location. Quality conscious customers long to produce their dream product. We wish to make their dream come true.
Comments