Case Study 1 - Carville & Becker
HOW BECKER Helped Carville TO BECOME MORE SUSTAINABLE
A CENTRAL VACUUM CASE STUDY
Becker provides a wide variety of vacuum pumps, compressors and vacuum systems to UK companies within different industry sectors. Below, Becker and Carville plastics showcase a real world case study and insights into how Becker can help you to reduce energy and maintenance costs with a central vacuum system.
Watch the case study video to see how Becker reduced energy consumption and maintenance costs at Carville Plastics.
HOW WE HELPED CARVILLE
TO MAKE IT BECKER
Carville approached Becker to help reduce their energy consumption and maintenance costs.
Becker site specialists conducted a full site survey to ascertain the possibility of effectively and efficiently reducing energy consumption whilst also driving down Carville’s maintenance costs.
Previously Carville used compressed air via a simple Venturi system to generate vacuum on the machines, however, as the product mix has changed over the years the company has required a greater number of vacuum systems across many of their machines.
Generating a vacuum via a Venturi system is inefficient and puts an increasing demand on compressors. Becker advised that Carville were using significant amounts of energy in generating this compressed air and could benefit from a new central vacuum system.
Becker worked closely with Carville in designing an improved vacuum system. The new installation includes 4x BCV 300 Claw Vacuum Pumps all with integrated inverter drives. The claw technology is extremely low maintenance, which reduced annual maintenance costs significantly vs the existing compressor.
A two-phase install approach was agreed upon between both companies, which helped to minimise the disruption to the production facility and the installation itself went very smoothly.
Video Transcript
Becker are a multinational compressor vacuum pump supplier, based in Germany. We provide a wide variety of vacuum pumps, compressors and systems to the whole of the UK.
Carville approached us with their problem and we conducted a full site survey to ascertain the possibility of reducing energy consumption and maintenance cost.
Richard Oxley
Managing Director – Becker
Vince Ellis
Managing Director – Carville
Carville are a contract manufacturer of precision machine CNC plastics. We also specialize in high accuracy diffusion bonded manifolds and these are fluidic manifolds, a bit like a PCB, but for fluids. We supply these into the medical device industry, life sciences and diagnostics.
Carville use our vacuum systems to securely hold down and position the plastic plates and vacuum fixtures ready for CNC machining.
We had an excess of compressed air in the facility and we basically used that compressed are via a simple Venturi system to generate vacuums on the machines. But as the product mix has changed over the years we have required more and more vacuum systems across most of the machines.
Generating a vacuum via a Venturi system is very inefficient so it put an increasing demand on the compressors.
Carville approached us to see if we could provide a solution and reduce their energy consumption. Following that full site survey, Becker's proposed solution was a new central vacuum system with all 22 CNC machines connected to a single ring main.
The vacuum system consists of four BCV 300 Claw Pumps all with integrated inverter drives. The compression chamber inside the claw pumps is completely oil and contact free meaning the vacuum pumps are extremely reliable and low maintenance.
Lawrence Huxley
Technical Sales Manager – Becker
Richard Oxley
The system is controlled by a vacuum plus controller which matched the demand by increasing or decreasing the speed of the pumps. This ensures the minimum amount of energy is used at all times.
We worked closely with Becker in designing how we would do the installation and we basically agreed we would do it in two phases and that really helped minimize the disruption to the production facility and the actual installation itself went very smoothly.
From our experience with Becker, I would definitely recommend them.
Vince Ellis
Lawrence Huxley
It has been fantastic working with Vince and the team. We have significantly reduced the energy consumption and that's enabled a return on investment in less than two years.
With energy prices constantly increasing, reducing energy consumption is a key driver for lot’s of businesses. Why not contact Becker today for a free site audit to see if you could achieve the same savings we’ve achieved here at Carville.
Richard Oxley
Case Study 2 - Crystal Doors and Becker
How Becker helped Crystal Doors reduce their carbon footprint within the woodworking industry.
A CNC case study within the woodworking industry
Becker provides a wide variety of vacuum pumps, compressors and vacuum systems to UK companies within different industry sectors. Below, Becker and Crystal Doors showcase a real world case study and insights into how Becker can help you to reduce energy and maintenance costs with your CNC machines within the woodworking industry.
Watch the case study video to see how Becker reduced energy consumption and maintenance costs at Crystal Doors in Rochdale.
Video Transcript
Hi I'm Hugh, I'm one of the Technical Sales Engineers at Becker. Becker UK have a long history of working with the woodworking industry. Our pumps can predominately be seen on CNC machines, as well as material handling equipment. A problem we often see within the industry is a poor vacuum supply to the CNC table. This can lead to boards slipping, tools being damaged, and also material wastage. The current set up at Crystal Doors combines three BCV Claw Pumps with a control panel on each CNC. This allows for maximum flexibility. The variable speed drives on each pump allow the pumps to slow down and speed up, depending on the vacuum level required for the product that's currently in production. Not only does this obviously help with energy reduction but this also helps with lower noise and sound emissions into the factory. On average adding this flexibility, customers will see around 20% decrease in energy consumption. We're here with Richard at Crystal Doors and through using some of the latest in vacuum technology, he’s been able to resolve some of these issues.
Hugh Smith
Technical Sales Manager - Becker UK
Richard Hagan
Managing Director - Crystal Doors
Since 1994, we've been manufacturing vinyl wrap doors for the kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom market and really diversifying into the different products that are possible with MDF, and then vinyl wrapping. This has come with its own challenges which is on the actual CNCs themselves as the different boards require different levels of vacuum to be able to hold them in place. And what we found over the recent years: is that we have chipping on the backs; we don't have enough vacuum; we have issues with the actual vacuums with the vanes breaking and therefore we have downtime. In the past, we didn't know when they were going to start failing.
Now what we've got is that security and peace of mind that we can run 24 hours a day, and have no issues.
The CNCs that we've got are six years old, usually that means replacing the whole machine. What Crystal Doors has done, is an investment just in the actual pumps themselves. To bring them better than the majority of companies that are buying brand new CNCs today. We've increased our productivity. We've increased our efficiency of energy. And we've reduced our number of remedials. This, combined with the matching of the amounts of vacuum that were required for the various different products that we have to go through the CNCs we've made a massive saving. Crystal Doors chose Becker because within the woodworking industry they've got the most technical ability to be able to understand the challenges that each of us face in trying to get our productivity up in the UK in manufacturing and it's exactly what happened when they came to Crystal Doors because we’d had other quotes and Becker beat everybody, hands down.
Hugh Smith
Techincal Sales Manager - Becker UK
It's been great working with a company like Crystal Doors who are committed to reducing their carbon footprint as well as creating high quality products. If you're looking to increase your vacuum supply, please call Becker today.
CONTACT BECKER FOR YOUR FREE SITE VISIT
Becker has made a name for itself worldwide in numerous application markets with vacuum pumps, compressors and air supply systems as a component and system supplier for many industry sectors including, but not exclusive to, woodworking, printing and paper, energy, medical, plastics, environmental and electronics industries.
Around 120,000 devices and systems leave the factories every year and are successfully installed in our client's businesses helping them save time, money and energy consumption.
To understand how Becker can help reduce your energy consumption and maintenance costs, book your FREE site visit on
01482 835280 or email sales@becker.co.uk. Join Carville and Crystal Doors in becoming an extremely satisfied customer.
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