Coal industry boosts Clitheroe turnover by 40%

Substantial investment over recent years by owners of coal mines in the UK has been instrumental in the increased turnover at Lancashire-based contract machinist, Clitheroe Light Engineering.

A large part of the subcontractor's business is the manufacture of internal hydraulic valve gear for equipment used in coal mines.

Investment in the sector is set to continue through 2009 and beyond, particularly at Daw Mill colliery in the West Midlands and at Hatfield and Kellingley in Yorkshire, where major refurbishment projects are underway.

An indication of the current strength of deep mining can be gauged from a press release issued by UK Coal on 5 January 2009, which reported that in 2008, Daw Mill achieved the highest annual output for any colliery in the history of coal mining in Britain.

The 680-man mine produced 3,218,000 tonnes from a single coal face, beating the previous best of 3,160,000 tonnes set by Selby's Wistow mine 13 years ago.

Looking further ahead, Clitheroe Light is actively concentrating on the aerospace industry for further business growth.

‘We were machining aerospace components in the early 1990s, mainly the parts that other subcontractors could not tackle, and we still produce components that are used in aircraft X-ray equipment,’ said Helen Meloy, director at Clitheroe.

‘We have much experience in the sector, but recent years have seen changes to the industry.

‘Direct suppliers now need the relevant infrastructure and approvals, which we are in the process of putting in place.’ The company already holds ISO 9001:2000 and is currently installing bonded material storage, traceability systems and other processes required for registration to the aerospace quality management system, AS9100, which it expects to receive by mid-2009.

Production of precision mill-turned parts is a significant part of the business, but what defines the company is its 34m-long, 72 pallet, flexible manufacturing system (FMS) for the production of prismatically machined components.

There are very few FMS of this size installed at subcontractors in the UK.

It runs 24/7, 365 days a year, taking the labour cost content out of the parts produced and helping Clitheroe Light to compete with overseas suppliers.

The existing Doosan and two Mori Seiki horizontal machining centres that are linked into the FMS will be joined by two more half-metre-cube HMCs when order levels justify further investment.

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