Operating an international network of facilities and serving a wide range of industries including aerospace, defence, automotive, power generation, oil & gas, construction, machine building, medical and transportation, Bodycote is the world’s largest and most respected provider of thermal processing services
These services are a vital part of any manufacturing process
and include:
Thermal processing is a vital part of any manufacturing process and
includes a variety of techniques and specialist engineering processes
which improve the properties of metals and alloys and extend the life
of components.
Without heat treatment aircraft engines would not last a single
flight and car gearboxes might only last a week – if you were lucky.
Without hot isostatic pressing the risk of catastrophic breakdown of
metal components would be far greater and the carbon footprint of
power stations would be dramatically higher. Without coatings,
construction fixings would rust away and thousands of everyday
objects would quickly lose their shine.
Peace of mind for manufacturers
for over 30 years
We never forget that our customers have invested time, money
and resources in all the components we process, which is why
quality comes as a standard part of our service, ensuring that all
our customers’ components are treated with care throughout.
Our facilities hold numerous international, national and customer
approvals appropriate to the services they offer and the markets
they serve.
Bodycote’s quality management systems, validated by major
engineering OEM’s, have been developed to meet the requirements of
both ISO 9001 and environmental standard ISO 14001. Additionally,
market-related standards such as AS 9100 for aerospace and TS 16949
for automotive have also been incorporated. Bodycote has also gained
the prestigious Nadcap accreditation at a large number of locations
throughout Europe and the USA, as well as approvals from major
aerospace companies and their supply chains.
Additionally, our transport services are linked with process and
production controls to deliver optimum logistics solutions for supply
chain customers. Our customers can be confident their demands can
be met, however stringent, with assured quality, cost-effectiveness
and on-time completion every time.
Although modern techniques are scientifically advanced, mankind has used heat treatment to improve the properties of metals for thousands of years; the first written evidence of quench hardening of weapons can be found in Homer’s Odyssey, written in 880 BC, wherein the author compares the hissing of the burning stake plunged into the eye of the Cyclops to the sound made by the armourer’s red hot sword during quenching.
Heat treatment is a controlled process used to alter the microstructure of materials such as metals and alloys to impart properties which benefit the working life of a component, for example increased surface hardness, temperature resistance, ductility and strength. Metal joining includes specialist processes such as electron beam welding, vacuum and honeycomb brazing; complex operations requiring a fusion of expertise and technology.
Bodycote offers an extensive range of heat treatment services and specialist metal joining techniques. With unmatched capacity and computerised systems, our facilities can process a wide range of component sizes to exacting standards with reliable, repeatable results.
Whilst offering all the heat treatment services you would expect from the world’s leading heat treater, Bodycote can also provide advanced specialist services including:
HIP combines very high temperature (up to 2,000°C) with inert gas under very high pressure (up to 30,000 psi) – equivalent to the Mariana Trench 11,000m deep in the Pacific Ocean. HIP is used to eliminate porosity in castings and consolidate encapsulated powders to give fully dense materials. Dissimilar materials can be bondedtogether to manufacture unique, cost effective components.
Every week a typical Bodycote HIP plant will process many tons of titanium, aluminium, steel and superalloy castings, removing porosity and uprating the performance of parts such as turbine blades, medical implants and turbochargers.
When a project requires advanced materials technology, working with Bodycote HIP could provide the ideal development and production route, allowing the engineer to optimise conventionally formed parts and also to design components unobtainable by other means. Bodycote HIP research specialists are experienced in working with customers to develop novel materials and applications.
With the largest operational capacity in the Western world, and a wide variety of sizes of equipment, Bodycote HIP is able to accommodate large volumes of small product as economically as large individual components.
Bodycote’s HIP services include:
Densification:
Powder Metallurgy:
Composites:
Specialist coatings are used extensively to prolong the working life of components and protect them from environmental factors such as corrosion and abrasion. The range of coatings available from Bodycote covers a wide variety of applications, providing solutions for manufacturers in virtually every market sector. Bodycote has particular expertise in providing surface technology solutions to customers in the aerospace, power generation and oil & gas sectors.
Bodycote provides indispensable coating systems for durability, anti-corrosion, wear resistance, improved hardness and electrical conductivity. The combination of modern computerised control and unrivalled coating expertise means that Bodycote can offer specialist ceramic and thermal spray coatings, thermal diffusion, duplex coatings and organics systems.
Bodycote is a specialist provider of K-Tech coatings – a unique range of thermochemically formed ceramic coatings for the prevention of wear and corrosion in a wide variety of severe industrial applications including complex geometric shapes and internal bores.
Bodycote’s surface technology services include:
Thermal Spray Coatings:
Thermal Diffusion Coatings:
Mechanical Plating:
Organic Coatings:
Other Coatings:
Precision Machining & Surface Finishing
