Quickslide upgrades automation
Two years ago, I was invited to Quickslide’s Brighouse based factory for the official unveiling of a new £1.71million Schirmer machining centre.
With a footprint of 4,120ft2 it was twice as big as the fabricator’s existing Schirmer machinery and had taken three days to be delivered from Germany, plus two months to install.
It was such a substantial and unique piece of kit, that the factory had to be completely reorganised in order to accommodate it.
A marvel of modern engineering, it enabled Quickslide to further enhance its product quality, improving lead times and reducing reliance on manual labour.
At the time, it represented a multimillion pound spend on infrastructure – but I was told that the company had plans for even more advanced automation that would raise the bar higher still for the manufacture of vertical sliding windows.
True to its word, Quickslide (has now unveiled phase two of a £3million investment strategy) with the arrival of new mech-weld machinery that has been designed to reduce the manufacturing time of mechanical sash windows from 15 minutes to just 90 seconds.
It does this while maintaining the kind of consistently high levels of quality that can only be achieved through state-of-the-art automation.
According to Quickslide’s managing director, Ben Weber, what used to take 15 people – carrying out various functions – can now be completed with just one operator ‘feeding’ two machines. That labour can now be redeployed elsewhere, which will be particularly valuable for the fabricator as it scales up the business.
And while the size of the investment is impressive, it should also be seen as a hugely encouraging sign for Quickslide’s customers, who can rest assured that they have partnered with a forward-thinking supplier that is prepared to build for the future, even when times are tough…