Posts

What is Earing?

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An overview of Earing Measurement for Aluminium sheet metal and can manufacturers. As a leading provider of Earing Measurement Machines to sheet metal and can manufacturers around the world, Huxley Bertram is often asked, “What is Earing?”

“Earing” is a waviness in the top edge of a cup drawn from sheet metal. When a cup is drawn the top edge is noticed to naturally form an oscillating pattern. This results from anisotropy of the rolled sheet caused by the rolling process. Each peak is known as an “Ear” and “Earing” is the ring of ears around the top of the cup. Typically cups form with 4, 6 or 8 ears, in opposing pairs, at specific angles to the rolling direction of the sheet.

Why Measure Earing?

The type, size, position, and proportion of the ears can give significant insight into the quality, formability and crystalline structure of the metal. It is often used for batch release of sheet aluminium. To reduce waste in the can making process, as excess material has to be trimmed off, beverage can makers often specify a “Mean Earing” (% of variation in ear peak to trough vs can height) range from their sheet metal supplier.
Earing Measurement is also used in metal forming research and development.

How is Earing Measured?

All standard Huxley Bertram Earing Measurement machines use a low force high accuracy contact probe to measure the vertical displacement, while a high accuracy rotary encoder measures the rotation position. Contactless laser measurement of the profile is also an option. All our machines comply with EN1669 the European Earing Measurement standard.

How is Data Presented and Analysed

The data from our machines is output in a standard file format which provides easy file exchange and comparison between machines. Our Advanced Earing Analysis Software, which is provided with each machine or as a standalone package, reads the file, creates Cartesian and Polar plots of the data and carries out calculations to indicate the earing characteristics of the sheet metal.
The software uses sophisticated algorithms to compensate for the effects of skew often present in drawn cups due to uneven clamp forces or lubrication in the drawing process. This provides highly reliable and repeatable earing analysis results. After skew compensation a number of further calculations are provided:

  • Mean Earing percentage and absolute value
  • Mean Height
  • Numbers of ears
  • Max and Min Earing values
  • Additional values to indicate the validity of the earing measurement

Multiple different earing profiles can be loaded in the software at once to compare profiles and calculation values. The charts can be manipulated and scaled to make comparison easy.

For more information on Huxley Bertram Earing Measurement machines, visit here

Huxley Bertram Opens Additional Facilities

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Huxley Bertram has opened additional facilities. The new unit opened in November 2018. It has 6,000 square feet of space and 5.8m eaves height, giving plenty of room for assembly, test and commissioning of tall systems.

New Huxley Bertram Website Launch

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We are excited to launch our new website and say goodbye to the old Huxley Bertram site.

Compaction Simulation Forum Europe Report

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The eighth Compaction Simulation Forum (CSF2018-EU) was held at University of Cambridge 17- 19 September 2018. Sponsored by Huxley Bertram, the Forum gathered 60 attendees from the UK, Europe and the USA. Sixteen universities from eight countries were represented, as well as eight pharmaceutical companies and ten equipment/services vendors. Leading UK companies such as GSK, Pfizer, BMS and Johnson Matthey were in attendance. The scientific programme included keynote addresses, podium presentations, flash presentations and posters. Martin Bennett, Huxley Bertram’s compaction expert, presented on the important effects of rotary tablet press elasticity.

Once again the CSF reflected a growing interest in numerical simulation as a companion to experimental simulation. Other important trends displayed at the event included:

  • Terahertz-based porosity assessment of pharmaceutical tablet
  • Continuous tablet production
  • The importance of servo-hydraulic compaction simulators in the field of tableting research.

Two similar events are in the planning process for 2019.

(Photographs courtesy of Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, University of Cambridge, and Daniel Markl, University of Strathclyde.)

Goodbye To The Old Huxley Bertram Website

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The old website has served us faithfully but it is time to say goodbye. By November 2018, we intend launching our new site.

Huxley Bertram Sponsors Compaction Simulator Forum USA

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Huxley Bertram is attending the Compaction Simulator Forum in San Francisco, USA, this week. Once again, we are sponsoring the forum too. For more information on the forum, visit www.compactionsimulation.com

UPDATE

We are pleased to report that the event was very successful attended by many major pharmaceutical firms and universities from across the USA and around the world.

 

Huxley Bertram Builds System With Largest XTS Unit

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In 2017, Huxley Bertram designed and built for a client a special purpose machine with the largest Beckhoff XTS (Extended Transport Delivery System) in the world. Read More…

Huxley Bertram Invests In New Haas Mill

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Early in 2017, Huxley Bertram invested in a new Haas TM-1P Mill. We are pleased to say that we also received a government grant via the Signpost 2 grants scheme to assist with the purchase. Much of the machining on systems is bought out from external contract firms but at the same time we find it invaluable maintaining our own in-house workshop.

Dr John Taylor Explains The Grasshopper Escapement In The Corpus Clock

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Dr John Taylor narrates the background behind the grasshopper escapement in the Corpus Clock. Here is some background to the Corpus Clock which was built at Huxley Bertram.

The full video is available here