Alliance Connect is an Australian foundry, that was founded in 2005 through the amalgamation of a number of well-respected casting businesses. The owners boast a history in the industry stretching back over 50 years and have continued to grow and prosper as a local manufacturer, while others around them have shut down or shifted their operations offshore. While in-house expertise and range of services has been a foundation of their business, their commitment to quality has been key to their growth and their partnership with AXT has been of great benefit here.
Alliance Connect were primarily involved with aluminium and copper alloys and serviced a diverse range of industries. In more recent times, they have continued to expand working with more specialty alloys including Ni resist and providing castings to the biomedical, petrochemicals and defence industries.
Traditionally, they had relied on outsourcing radiographic work to help refine the casting process, visual inspections and mechanical tests to verify the quality of their castings. However, the radiographic work was expensive and would typically take weeks to turn around resulting in extended lead times. Furthermore, some of the mechanical testing was destructive and would require more parts to be made.
In 2021, with the aim of further improving their quality and streamlining their operation, Alliance Connect purchased a cabinet X-ray machine from Nissan Casting. They in turn had recently upgraded their system to an Yxlon MU-2000D sourced via AXT. The cabinet-based system served them well for a number of months but started showing signs of age. Having identified the value of the capability to the business, Alliance Connect looked for a company with the expertise to upgrade their system and turned to AXT.
Following a detailed consultive process to understand their needs and expectations, AXT recommended upgrading numerous components such as the X-ray source, high-voltage generator and control unit. With a clear understanding of what was involved, AXT was commissioned to perform the upgrades with modules from Comet X-ray.
The upgrades provided a revelation. At the front end, the usability has been improved with a new user-friendly graphical interface, while several processes have also been automated, reducing the burden on operators. It also provides a better understanding of how the system operates. In conjunction with hardware upgrades, this has culminated in a 50% faster work rate, resulting in higher throughput rates, with the system typically being used for 4hrs per day.
The system has also been integrated into their workflow where it is used for process optimisation. Technical Manager, Richard Seymour-Wright explains, “As a jobbing shop, we are always needing to cast different components. Having in-house X-ray inspection allows us to rapidly check castings and refine our process. Previously it could take weeks to get results, now we can cast a part, inspect it and decide what processing variable to change in as little as 10 minutes, providing almost real-time process control.”
He went further to say, “X-ray inspection also allows us to non-destructively inspect finished parts as a final quality check. In the past, sometimes our visual inspections didn’t reveal subsurface defects. Our in-house X-ray inspection has reduced our defect rate at the customer end to less than 1%, improving our overall customer experience, in conjunction with reduced lead times. And this is where we need to be with our defence contracts.”
Speaking about his experience dealing with AXT, he commented, “we have been very happy with the sales and after sales service from AXT. They offered us great advice on the proposed options to upgrade our machine, and the install was well planned and went very smoothly.”
With an increased need for local manufacturing, the upgrades to their X-ray inspection capabilities for both process optimisation and quality control, along with other planned expansions, put Alliance Connect in a great position to service local industries and provide quality products, potentially offering a superior option to source parts from overseas.