Since being commissioned 1 ½ years ago the EB welding chamber K640 has proved reliable performance for our customer Rolls-Royce plc at Barnoldswick, England. First and foremost the machine is used for welding front bearing housings (ROV – ring of vanes) of the Trent 900 series. This titan component with a diameter of almost 2 meters resides immediately behind the main air intake blade wheel of the turbine. However the part is not related to the latter irregularities of this engine type.

From a technical aspect Rolls-Royce is taking a new approach with the automation of the seam tracking and is progressing towards an automated production process. In total the machine has welded approximately 200 front bearing housings. That is equivalent to 22160 welding seams with a total length of 4.9 km EB welding seam. 98% of the welding has been done automatically without any operator interaction. In addition the reduction of the process time by 50% is quite a remarkable result. Last year the team operating the machine has won the “Rolls-Royce Technology Price” for the project.

The machine is highly regarded within Rolls-Royce community. Results of the application have shown positive effects on successive projects. Currently work is underway to apply EB welding to the next generation of jet engines.

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