Ashe Converting Equipment Invest in Additional Machining Capabilities

Established for nearly 40 years, ASHE Converting Equipment are a leading global supplier of slitting and rewinding machinery with nearly 1000 machines installed. Based in Ipswich, United Kingdom, the company have recently made significant investments in additional machine tools to expand the percentage of machine parts manufactured within the company. Along with this, the company have also recruited additional mechanical and software engineers to join the existing team, with fresh ideas in new developments on converting machinery and expanding the ASHE range further. ASHE have also adopted an apprenticeship scheme for factory personnel so that a younger generation are able to learn skills from an established workforce in the design, manufacture and build of premium slitting and rewinding machinery. Since the company’s inception in 1976, ASHE have always taken the philosophy of ‘in house manufacture’. This started with the manufacture of drive control systems, which to this day, can still be repaired and serviced by ASHE’s team of engineers. Natural progression in the range of slitting and rewinding machinery that the company supplied led to expansion in mechanical machining of machine parts, sideframes and rollers. Within the ASHE range are machines from widths as narrow as 300mm, up to a maximum of 8.7 metres. Nowadays, many machine builders rely on sub contractors to manufacture parts for their machinery, which has led to many becoming focused on ‘assembly only’. ASHE have a different philosophy to this, and are now at a stage where up to 90% of mechanical parts can be machined in house on a typical duplex centre winder. The percentage figure is now likely to be increased with the addition of further CNC machine tools which give the company additional capacity, meaning that ASHE do not have a heavy reliance on third parties manufacturing machine parts. In the end, this gives added benefit to our customers in that we are able to supply most mechanical parts throughout the life of an ASHE machine. The very first ASHE machine supplied in 1987 is still in use today, and we are still able to fully support the machine mechanically and electrically. On today’s machines, along with the mechanical machining mentioned, ASHE have a dedicated team of software engineers, who’s focus is on writing software for proven machines and development of new software for new slitting and rewinding technology, to be launched by the company soon. Software for the PLC, AC drives and HMI is all undertaken by the companies own engineers, all of which can be monitored and supported through a modem link. With this, we are able to give full support to all ASHE machines in the field, and there are a range of support packages that the company offer to machines of a certain age or purchased on the second hand market. ASHE are an established company, with innovative technology on all their machinery. This is reflected in the number of machines installed around the world. This year, ASHE are attending the INFO Flex exhibition and Converters Expo in USA, along with Drupa and K 2016. During these exhibitions, new developments are to be showcased along with presentations of the current machinery range.

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