Expertise in manufacturing, materials and biomedical

Subject group leader: Dr Les Mitchell

Group expertise

Expertise in the Manufacturing, Materials and Biomedical Group include:

  • biomedical devices.
  • industrially sponsored materials research.
  • logistics.
  • Manufacturing and Quality Systems Reliability Engineering.
  • microstructural and failure analysis.
  • Materials processing and materials joining processes.
  • materials recycling.
  • natural fibre composites research.
  • operations management.
  • project management.

Facilities

  • Composites – Lay-up, cutting and curing (large autoclave with AIC controller)
  • Materials analysis – DSC, DMA, Electron Probe analysis, E-Dax
  • Materials testing – tension, compression, torsion, impact, fatigue
  • Microscopy – Optical, Scanning Electron, Atomic force, Mounting and polishing

Case study

A local company, Bilt Hamber Laboratories, who develop and sell a number of corrosion protection products wanted some independent testing undertaken on various wax coatings.

The company supplied 6 different competitor wax coating products, including one of their own products to undergo an accelerated corrosion test (based on ASTM B117-03).

The material testing lab, which is equipped with a salt spray chamber, was used to undertake a full investigation of the performances of these products.

The results qualified and ranked the performance of the products.