Dalau Ltd is one of the biggest fluoropolymer manufacturers in the UK, exporting over 11 million components to 35 countries every year. They work across industries including electronics, engineering, aerospace and medical, ensuring the highest quality components for their customers.
Dalau has invested in the Stratasys J35 3D printer from SYS Systems. This has allowed them to produce bespoke jigs and fixtures unmanned, making capacity available on their CNC machines.
SYS Systems is the platinum partner of Stratasys in the UK, supplying and supporting the full range of world-renowned 3D printing technologies from prototyping through to production.
Project Brief:
Dalau are constantly investing in the latest technology. With quality at the forefront of everything they manufacture, Dalau need to ensure that the parts they manufacture are of high accuracy, consistency and traceability.
Dalau were looking to upgrade some of their old machines to the latest technology, and made contact with SYS Systems to explore their 3D printing solutions to produce unmanned jigs and fixtures.
“A lot of our fixtures needed to be within 0.05 of a millimetre. As a company that works to such tight tolerances, we wanted to start creating fixtures that would need to be extremely accurate,” said Blair Stephenson, Technical Assistant and Project Engineer at Dalau.
“For the jigs, they’ve got to be accurate or you’ll put them out of tolerance. We were relying on the engineering department to machine up jigs and fixtures, which would take up a lot of their time.” added David Sage, Managing Director of Dalau.
The Solution:
Dalau invested in the Stratasys J35 desktop 3D printer, supplied by SYS Systems, Platinum Partner of Stratasys, to produce unmanned, bespoke jigs and fixtures, creating capacity on their CNC machines.
The J35 is a precision 3D printer that can produce parts and prototypes accurately, quickly and affordably to streamline and support your manufacturing processes.
“With the J35 3D printer, the engineers can design the fixture on the software, download it and the printer will make the jig,” said David.
“We didn’t want to go to a very large scale and for the fixtures we use, the J35 was ideal,” said Blair.
The Benefits:
Investing in a 3D printer from SYS Systems has allowed Dalau to enhance their manufacturing processes and upgrade their old machines to the latest technologies. Dalau is now able to ensure speed, accuracy and traceability in order to streamline their manufacturing processes.
Blair explained the benefits of Dalau’s new investments:
“It allows us to develop stuff for ourselves and for our customers within a very tight time period. We now do a lot of development work for customers which is another line we’ve opened up since installing the J35 and its one we want to explore more. With 3D printing, you can make whatever you want, there are no limits to what we could design with our fixtures. There are so many aspects within the models you can change. The rubberised coating, the colours and the materials, to have flexibility in the fixture. The support is there. Any issue, we just send SYS Systems the project, they’ll have a look at it and explain either where we’ve gone wrong, or what needs changing.”
Why SYS Systems and Stratasys?
SYS Systems supplies and supports the full range of Stratasys’ world-renowned 3D printing technologies in the UK, helping customers with every stage of the manufacturing process, from prototyping through to production.
SYS Systems is part of the Carfulan Group who specialise in providing the most advanced manufacturing technologies available, helping customers across their five divisions to achieve optimal performance and end-product excellence.
