Thursday, January 7, 2016

News: Professorship for inaugural AMRC team member

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Sam Turner, one of the founding researchers from the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) has been appointed Professor of Machining Practice.

Based on the Advanced Manufacturing Park (AMP) and a partner in the HVM Catapult (the government's strategic initiative that aims to revitalise the manufacturing industry), the AMRC focuses on advanced machining and materials research for aerospace and other high-value manufacturing sectors. It is a partnership between industry and academia, which has become a model for research centres worldwide.

The centre recently put in place a new corporate structure as it aims to double its turnover to in excess of £80m over the next five years.

Prof Turner joined the AMRC at its start, after studying Mechanical Engineering with French Language in Sheffield and Grenoble and gaining industrial experience with Thomas Turton & Sons, in Chesterfield, where he set up a new machine shop and modernised its heat treatment facilities.

He joined the manufacturing group, set up at the University of Sheffield by Prof Keith Ridgway CBE, who had been his supervisor on the Teaching Company Scheme and is now executive dean of the AMRC.

The manufacturing group was starting to build its contacts with aerospace giant Boeing and developing its expertise in machining when, with Boeing's support, Prof Ridgway and Adrian Allen OBE set up the AMRC.

Turner is an authority on machining Titanium alloys, and holds a Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Sheffield in addition to his PhD in Titanium machining. His PhD research laid the foundations for the development of a major area of expertise at the AMRC, which has fuelled its growth and helped its partners radically improve their competitiveness and capabilities for processing new alloys vital to reducing the weight, noise and fuel consumption of aircraft.

Prof. Turner, who is also chief technical officer at the AMRC (pictured), said: "It's a great honour and it comes at an exciting time when big opportunities are opening up around digital manufacturing.

"I see our Factory 2050 development as the UK flagship for digital manufacturing and my role as CTO as enabling and delivering high impact projects that change the UK’s manufacturing infrastructure and support the sector's growth.

"I want to ensure the AMRC is recognised as the place to come to for state of the art manufacturing science, bringing new technology through the development pipeline that will improve productivity and help both existing companies and the start-ups that I believe will come out of the AMRC environment."

The group spans all of the 560 employee, £50m turnover operations of the AMRC and the Nuclear AMRC, the AMRC Training Centre, AMRC Casting Centre and Cti Ltd.

The AMRC recently got the keys to its £43m Factory 2050, the revolutionary, glass-walled "reconfigurable factory" at the heart of the University of Sheffield's new advanced manufacturing campus on Sheffield Business Park.

AMRC website

Images: AMRC

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