Soligen Announces a Breakthrough in Automotive Cylinder Head Development
7 August 2000
Soligen Announces a Breakthrough in Automotive Cylinder Head Development
NORTHRIDGE, Ca. - Soligen Technologies, Inc., a rapid manufacturer of complex metal parts using proprietary technology, today announced that it received approval from Orbital Engine Company Pty, Ltd. to disclose Soligen's record breaking program for making their complex multi-cylinder head.On March 31st of this year Soligen shipped a fully machined DSPC cast inline-4 cylinder head to Orbital. This cylinder head is part of a new Gasoline Direct Injection engine program that Orbital is developing for a leading European automotive manufacturer.
Peter Simons, head of Strategic Alliances for Orbital, U.K., sought the help of Soligen when their project started slipping behind schedule. "We saw Soligen as the only option", said Simons. Soligen delivered an assembly of Aluminum cast and machined cylinder head and two cam covers in less than 4 weeks from receiving Orbital's CAD data. It was accomplished by using Soligen's proprietary Direct Shell Production Casting (DSPC) process. "Our engine program is running very well," states Steve Watson, test engineer at Orbital Engine Company, Australia. "We have been very happy with the structural integrity of the Soligen castings. We now have several hundred hours of operation on the Soligen Cylinder head without any incident or hardware failure. Previously we were looking for a turn-around time of such a sand-cast cylinder head (including machining) in about 12 weeks. With Soligen's help we saved around 7-8 weeks. This time saving has been critical to the success of the program."
"Soligen has successfully used DSPC in numerous cylinder head development programs over the years with the Orbital project resulting in the latest record-breaking turn around," said Yehoram Uziel, President and CEO of Soligen. "The ability of Soligen's DSPC process to provide functional, production-intent prototypes in a fraction of the time of conventional methods, means that engine development can be accelerated to the point of saving years not just months in testing," "Engine development requires hot and cold weather testing. Long lead times involved in implementing new designs had limited engine designers to a single weather testing cycle per year. With Soligen allowing faster turn around of functional engines, hot or cold weather testing could be performed twice a year, yielding a 50% time reduction in the commercialization of new engines."
Soligen's DSPC technology enables Soligen to rapidly manufacture cast metal parts, bypassing the traditional need for tooling. The DSPC technology is a proprietary fabrication process for metal parts that produces ceramic molds for casting fully functional metal parts directly from a CAD file. This means fabricating expensive, time consuming casting tooling can be postponed until after the parts are functionally tested, increasing the probability of making production tooling once and correctly on the first attempt. Additionally, Soligen rapidly produces production tooling for larger runs of metal castings from the same CAD file as the approved part. By combining three key production elements--DSPC technology, conventional casting methods, and Computerized Numerical Control machining practices--the Company has created the first "one stop shop" for functional metal parts made directly from a CAD file and ready for assembly. This complete service, trademarked as Parts Now, has become a single source for rapidly manufactured metal parts.
