As a world leader in the design and manufacture of fiber-reinforced composite processing solutions, Surface Generation Limited serves a customer base that includes blue chip original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and Tier 1 automotive suppliers. The company’s success derives from its intelligent moulding process, which has created a paradigm shift in terms of cost, quality, and delivery at all stages of composites production.
Founded in 2002, Surface Generation has developed advanced composites production techniques that cut cycle times, reduce energy consumption, and require less factory floor space. The company’s innovative solutions give customers the ability to guarantee Production to Functional Specifications (PtFS). Surface Generation’s patented technology can combine, compact, process, and meld composite materials more efficiently and precisely than traditional autoclave or oven processes. The company’s machines are used across a range of industries, including aerospace, automotive, defence, and leisure.
Surface Generation’s composites production machines include both electrical and mechanical design elements. While the manufacturer has realized productivity gains in systems development on the mechanical side for several years— leveraging SOLIDWORKS® CAD, FEA (finite element analysis), and CFD (computational fluid dynamics) tools—it sought similar efficiency improvements in electrical design to support growth, according to Senior Software Engineer Pete Massey.
“We had been working with a range of products, including basic drawing packages and schematic preparation tools, as well as more advanced electrical modelling tools and work flows,” Massey explains. “We reached the point where we could see a growing disconnect between the mechanical and electrical design sides of the business, so we felt it imperative to assess tools and work flows that could potentially straddle these two design activities.
