Speaker Background

Thank you to Abdul and Gary for taking the time next Thursday to tell us how electron microscopy has made a positive difference to their companies, both based in Plymouth:

 Gary Hughes – Barden Corporation (UK) Ltd

Gary joined Barden, a world leader in the design and manufacture of super precision ball bearings, as a Technician Engineer in 1996 after studying Mechanical Engineering at Loughborough University. Initially, he provided support to the Engineering teams (reports, calculation, examinations, drawings) before progressing through the department in various roles (Design & Development Engineer, Product Engineer, Senior Engineer) before being appointed as the Product Engineering Manager in 2011 where he manages a team of 14 engineers, including product design engineers and application engineers.

The company has used the EMC for almost 20 years; initially when Barden started developing their super-finishing techniques and standard optical microscopy just didn’t provide sufficient magnification or resolution to understand how the surface finish of their products could be influenced.

As well as surface finish, Barden has increasingly used the EMC for other analysis, including failure analysis of bearings (either from the field or those in production); examination of grain micro-structure; identification of elements associated with known contaminants; distinguishing between coatings and their substrates.

Abdul Saeid – Fine Tubes Ltd

Abdul joined Fine Tubes Ltd, a global metal tubing manufacturer, in January 2013 as a Process Engineer. Prior to this, he was a researcher at the National Centre for Industrial Microwave Processing (NCIMP) at the University of Nottingham where he also completed his PhD in February 2012.

Having made the jump from academia to industry, he has appreciated the benefits of analytical tools, such as SEM (scanning electron microscopy) and EDAX, from different perspectives. During his doctorate in Chemical Engineering he was involved in characterising the mineralogy of oil sand and oil shale deposits. He then worked as a Research Associate developing novel techniques for processing contaminated North Sea oil drill cuttings using SEM to determine the micro-structure of varying feed stocks.

Whilst at Fine Tubes, use of SEM technology has been primarily for assisting in root cause analysis, assessing properties of raw materials and as part of studies into developing new production techniques. It is hoped that future use of SEM will allow Fine Tubes to enhance production efficiency and generate new lines for production.

To register for next Thursday's breakfast, please go to:

www.surveymonkey.com/s/EMC_workshop_3rdApril

Or feel free to contact Claire Pearce for more details about the event, the free support we can offer to eligible businesses and the EMC in general:
- 01752 588908
- 07738 858494
- claire.pearce@plymouth.ac.uk