Mecahers Aeronautica, one of Europe's major independent manufacturers of detailed metallic aerospace parts, has invested in a state-of-the-art high pressure fluid cell press from Quintus Technologies to support its role in the Airbus widebody aircraft program.

Installed at the Mecahers facility in Setubal, Portugal, outside of Lisbon, the new 800 bar (11,600 psi) Flexform press will be instrumental in the fabrication of components to meet Airbus' capacity ramp-up.

"Our Setubal facility, in AICEP Global Parques' Bluebiz Parque, is Mecahers' center of excellence for hard metal sheet fabrications and complex assemblies, concentrating in particular on hard aluminum, stainless steel, and titanium in the forming area," states Mr. Patrick Razat, President, Mecahers Group. "One of the reasons why we bought the press from Quintus was to increase our production capacity and capability in Portugal."

The Quintus high pressure press, with a forming area of 700 x 1800 mm (27.6 x 73 inches) will introduce a number of production efficiencies. The hydroforming process requires only one rigid tool half, generating significant tool cost savings, eliminating several forming operations, intermediate heat treatments, and operator dependencies.

"Today's challenges in new aeronautical programs ramp-up and the need of being more competitive in regard to new aerospace business place completely new fabrication demands on the supply chain," Mr. Razat continues. "With this investment, we are gearing up to meet those challenges and demands. We expect the high pressure forming process will allow us to both reduce the fabrication steps required and to minimize the need for costly hand corrections."

"The added value of the high pressure process allows Tier 1 sheet metal parts suppliers to meet the quality, volume, and cost demands of major aerospace OEMs like Airbus," observes Jan Soderstrom, CEO of Quintus Technologies. "We see the same trend all over the western world, where primarily Airbus, Boeing, and Bombardier are forcing the supply chain to move away from a relatively high dependency on well-trained and skilled labor at the shop floor to a higher level of forming die design, combined with modern high pressure forming technologies."

Mr. Razat adds, "We chose Quintus as our partner not only because they supply the most advanced high pressure equipment available in the market, but also for their ability to offer a long-term technology transfer program and willingness to enter into a close business relationship and their application knowledge."