ruchi - factory visit

Hello Sir,

Our visit to different factories provided a great exposure and was an eye opener to us. We discovered the practical difficulties that the labourers face and the different techniques of working in a particular medium. We came to know the manufacturing processes with which I was ignorant earlier.

Aluminium Factory

We first visited a small aluminium unit owned by Mr. Rajendra Singh where raw material

was procured from local places for the production of aluminium sheets. Wire scraps, bus body parts and waste utensils were used as the raw material and melted in air blast oil fired furnace. The metal gets charged at 650⁰C due to the pressure applied by the air blower. The metal settles at the bottom and the metal oxide segregates above. The cover flux which constitutes zinc oxide, salt and other impurities are removed with the help of a long iron tool. To purify the metal, a chemical quench is applied and the impurities pass out in the form of bubbles by with the passage of chlorine gas. Immediately after this process the melted metal is thrown into a cast iron book mould where it gains the shape of a sheet. This is further carried by hot rolling followed by cold rolling process which stretches the length of the metal sheet and makes it hard. In order to release the hardness the analing is done in a furnace which has the capacity of 800 kg. Finally, the metal sheets are cut in square and circular shapes and sold to the factories of nearby markets that make utensils such as pressure cooker and bus body parts. We also visited another small manufacturing unit where some machines were modified for more productivity. Though big rolling machines are available in Hindalco, grooves were being made on

checqers sheet used in floors of cars, trucks etc. These machines were made on the basis of Propergy plant and the whole unit was set up in 1973.

Wood Factory

After the visit we were back to the institute, had a short discussion with Mr. Nandan Ghiya and again left for the next visit to a Wood factory in Malviya Industrial area owned by Mr. Samir Wheaton. He had working units at Delhi and Bangalore also where further assembling of the parts of the product were carried. He made furniture for hotels as wells as conference halls; majority of which were exported. Both contemporary and traditional designs were available. They used panel and solid wood machines, the raw materials were cut in separate premises. The wood was stacked into seasoning plant for drying and rotation took place every 15 days. The walls of the seasoning plant was made of high density thermocol with a cemented layer on it. Heaters were placed in both the corners to gather 20 liters of water every day. The three type of machine used were electrical, mechanical and pneumatic. The machines were highly developed and efficient enough to require minimum amount of manpower. Multiple boring machinery was one of the pneumatic machine which could make multiple holes at a time. four sided planned having 8 blades could plan the panel precisely from all the four sides at a time. The sawdust was sucked in the air bags through the pipes attached to the planner. This provided a safe and healthy work environment. The whole process was less time consuming. A blade block made of tungsten carbide was used to cut a curved surface. Another machine which worked from top to bottom made perfect grooves in one shot. Apart from the workshop, there was a design studio above where the designing and other processes took place. He also designed furniture using different materials such as cane, leather, metal and stone and the outcome was amazingly good.

Plastic Factory

From the wood factory we departed to a small pump manufacturing unit owned by Mr. Y.S. Bahti in Surdshanpura. There we saw the process of hand and press molding. They used delerine, a non-wearing plastic granules which is not recycled. Nylon66, a polyamide was also used to make spare parts of water pump. The plastic granules melted at a temperature of 80⁰ C. The plastic moulds were covered with magnet so as to use in magnet motors. Being a very small unit this could not provide detailed information about different processes in manufacturing plastic products. Mr. Bahti the took us to another small unit nearby where mainly polycarbonate and ABS were used for making the moulds or other plastic products.

Both the units were set up on a very small scale so in comparison to the metal and wood factories the plastic factory did not prove to be of much help to us.

During all our visits we also realized the practicalities of working in different mediums and how different each manufacturing processes are from another. The visit was a good learning experience as well as a good exposure to get the feel of industrial processes.

regards

ruchi