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In 1966 DAVID NEWMAN commenced grinding performance camshafts on a Churchill cam grinder that he
modified for non-production camshaft manufacture. One of the first camshafts that he ground was
for the Competition Department of the Rootes Motor Company, now Peugeot, grinding Hillman Hunter
and Imp competition camshafts.
As a company, we continued to manufacture and grind performance camshafts.
During the early 1980's, there was a substantial increase in the production of overhead
camshaft engines, many of which suffered from premature camshaft and cam follower wear.
We received enquiries regarding the manufacture of replacement camshafts, rocker arms,
cam followers, and we took a decision to expand into the production of new parts.
This increase in production, led to a large expansion of new manufacturing plant and
staff, with 70% of our production being exported.
During the late 1980's we saw that the hardenable iron camshafts that had been the
normal camshaft material, mainly in use in America and some engines in Europe, was not
wear-resistant enough for OHC engines, so we worked with a UK foundry to develop small
batch runs of chilled iron castings, making our own pattern equipment. This enabled us
to offer, in some cases, parts that were of better quality than the OE part.
At this time, we had enquiries for out-of-production camshafts for car and motorbike engines,
and we developed a range of camshafts for, mainly, sports car engines and motorcycle engines.
By the early 1990's we had increased our manufacturing plant to 5 CNC Turning Centres,
4 CNC Milling Centres, 1 CNC Cylindrical Grinder, 6 Rocker Arm Grinders and 6 Camshaft Grinders,
together with a fully equipped Inspection Department.
During 1996/7 we were beginning to have enquiries for prototype camshaft work from engine development
companies, and we realized that, whilst camshaft grinding equipment was suitable for full and
semi-production camshaft production, it did not lend itself to prototype work, and we decided
that the only way to solve this problem was the purchase of a new CNC Cam Grinder. This was delivered in 1997.
From 1998 to 2002 we moved into the production of performance camshafts in steel and chilled iron,
manufacturing cams for F1, F3, BTCC, ETCC, DTM, FIA, GT Le Mans, MOTO GP etc.
In 2002 we noticed that we were receiving enquiries for re-entry camshaft profiles, ground by CNC
cam grinders. At this time, there were no re-entry CNC camshaft grinders available for prototype
work in the UK. We decided to have new re-entry cam software written and an additional small wheel
grinding head made for our Landis CNC cam grinder to fulfill this function. This was introduced in 2003.
We then realized that we were running out of capacity for CNC grinding and during 2004, we purchased
another Landis CNC cam grinder, together with a CNC Studer cylindrical grinder that can grind camshaft
bearing journals on camshafts up to a metre in length.
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