Element invests in creep, stress rupture testing

Element Materials Technology has invested in increasing its creep and stress rupture testing capabilities and capacity by designing and building its own smart test frames.

The creep and stress rupture test frames are programmable, allowing Element to perform various tests and to make modifications or additions more efficiently. The frames do not use dead weights, so technicians are not required to load weights onto them to perform a test. Instead, force is applied at the push of a button, minimizing risk and reducing turnaround times. They also have a decreased footprint to maximize each laboratory’s capacity, resulting in faster speed of service and reducing operating costs.

The smart frames can also be repurposed to meet customer demand in other areas, including tensile testing, high/low cycle fatigue testing, and further applications with continued platform development to ensure testing can align with shifting customer requirements.

To date, Element has built 255 machines. They are located at the Group’s laboratories around the world, including Huntington Beach, California; Charlotte, North Carolina; Sheffield, UK; Plzen, Czech Republic; Shanghai, China; and Toulouse, France. The investment primarily support Element’s destructive testing capabilities in the aerospace sector but can also be used to serve the transportation and oil & gas industries.

Rick Sluiters, EVP Aerospace at Element, said, “Our frames are specified to be more technologically advanced, which allows us to considerably increase our efficiency and capacity and therefore shorten lead times for our customers. We are now in a position to test in higher volumes and take on testing projects of a larger scale across the business.”

Element has more than 80 years’ experience in commercial and military aerospace testing and dedicates more than 3,000 technicians, engineers, and scientists to the sector. The company has 29 Nadcap-accredited laboratories with 46 Nadcap accreditations, plus various customer approvals.