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The Maxipart® Journey to High Performance

Every Maxipart® product goes through a long process to bring it into our range. This takes several months, and involves a lot of work.

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Stage 1 - We consult

The number 1 steer for us in producing Maxipart® high performance wearing parts has always been customer demand;

If we hear a recurring theme regarding an existing part in the market we will listen, discuss ways to improve, and make development suggestions. That way the part is born not out of a cost-cutting exercise, but out of a farmer-led desire to produce a part that will last for longer, produce better tillage results, and reduce downtime.

“Our customers’ advice is gold dust to us. You’re the experts, after all!”

Stage 2 - We refine...

Next we sketch ideas, make notes and use our design team to produce a CAD technical drawing. We’ll discuss these drawings with our team based on customer demand and check that we’ve included the suggested amends, making sure we have added in anything else to improve wear life and reduce draft. We also work with independent metallurgists as well as approved Maxipart® manufacturers to ensure that the correct metal alloys are used with regards to stress, wear and cost effectiveness.

Once we’re satisfied that the product looks right on paper its then time to get prototypes made in the foundry.

The prototype parts are then checked independently against our drawings, and are checked for correct fitment. We then check that the prototype part is made from the correct metal, and has been hardened correctly.

Once we’re satisfied that parts fit neatly and securely then we take them to the field, and this is the real moment of truth for prototype parts.

Stage 3 - We test

We try to include a wide variety of soil types in our rigorous field-tests to ensure that real-life performance is replicated as much as possible. Parts are run until worn or throughout the season, in comparison to other market leading non original and original products. We record the acreages that they have worked, and then analyse the wear that has occurred to see if the outcome is acceptable. Our aim is to maximise the wear life and performance of the part, in order to guarantee that farmers fitting Maxipart® can do so with absolute confidence in the brand.

Not every trial is successful and every design doesn’t always win, and that’s the point; if it doesn’t perform it won’t make it through to production. We then pour over the tested part, examining the design alterations we’ve made – have they worked? Has wear life been extended? Does the metal composition have the right degree of flex and hardness in the right places? Is the tungsten in the right place? Are we producing a product that stands apart from the crowd? And most importantly, can we add the Maxipart® quality stamp of approval?

Once we are absolutely happy with how the product has performed at the trial stage, we will then move to the next stage.

Stage 4 - We deliver

Only when we can be certain that the product is truly a high performance product, will we take the next step.

We give the green light to start production in readiness for the oncoming season. Lead times can be long, so a huge amount of forward planning goes into ensuring that stock is available for the time when the product will actually be used.

Stock arrives in good time ahead of the season, and we will check each batch of product to ensure that it meets our high quality control demands.

Manufacturing

Maxipart® Manufacturing Practices

Maxipart® products are produced using a variety of manufacturing practices, and this is dependent on the nature, style and requirements of the product. The production method will be decided at the initial design stage when the concept is discussed.

At every stage we must be able to adhere to all of our quality control procedures, handle bulk orders in a specified time, and most importantly produce products that match the CAD drawings every time without fail. At no point do we cut corners to reduce costs – the part quality comes first and foremost. With Maxipart® the consistency of quality is guaranteed. Here are the different practices we use;

 

The most common method of creating a cast product is by using the Lost-wax process method.

A steel mould is injected with liquid wax, which solidifies within the mould and creates an exact wax model replica of the part you wish to cast. The wax model is then encased in an outer shell, once hardened around the wax mould, will be immersed in a warm liquid to release the wax inside, leaving the shell with a hollow core. Molten metal is then poured into the hollow shell and allowed to cool, creating a cast duplicate. This is the most common method for Maxipart® products, not only does it allow us to create duplicate parts consistently and quickly. Using this technique also allows greater flexibility with regards to increased hardness and wear rate requirements and specific metallurgy requests, as different alloys can be increased or decreased in the cast ‘mix,’ to help ensure optimum wear.

With the lost-wax method of manufacturing, the heating and cooling of metal has a size tolerance which can sometimes lead to marginal size differences and fitment issues. Quality control checks on the assembly line are crucial to ensure correct fitment. Non-fitting parts are adjusted or discarded before shipment.

 

Laser cutting is typically used for parts that are predominantly flat, or very precise in their fitment and shape.

Sheet-steel is purchased to the correct thickness, cut using a laser and then folded to create the right shape. A good example of this would be a subsoil leg or slitting tines for a direct drill.

The main advantage of laser cutting is that it is very accurate to recreate a product based from a CAD drawing.

 

Forging is a traditional method of working metal by applying huge pressure and heat to press a part into shape using a mould. Once complete, it is cooled and hardened. This process is commonly used to manufacture bulk volume and parts that don’t have deep holes or openings in them, for example Maxipart® plough parts and cultivator points. Using this method ensures that most impurities and air pockets are compressed out of the alloy leaving a uniformly hardened product. Forgings can be more costly than castings and for some parts, but by no means all, can be considered to give better wear characteristics. An example where a forging may be better is on hedge cutting flails with cutting edges staying sharper for longer, and are also able to be sharpened over and over.

 

Tungsten carbide has the highest tensile strength of any natural metal, which makes it ideal for improving life of wearing parts. This is very intricate process fuses a tungsten tile to a pre-tempered steel part to create a virtually unbreakable bond. What is essential in this is ensuring that the base metal is thick enough and tempered properly to the correct hardness after the tungsten tile has been applied.

We’re shocked by the difference in wear with Maxipart®, it clearly out-performs the competition! Since using Maxipart® our output per day has gone up a huge amount.
JA PearceBerkshire
I was getting 50 to 60 acres a point when using standard knock-on points, and needed to get 200 acres out of the Boxer point to justify the price. After working 230 acres they are still in almost perfect shape, and showing very little signs of wear. I have happily reordered for autumn cultivations.
Colin Godwin/Keysley LtdWarminster
We are very pleased with the Maxipart® Topdown points – we trialled them against original points, and after 900 acres in a hard, dry season, we were hugely impressed with the wear of the Maxipart®point in comparison.
Hanford LtdDorset
We ran the Maxipart® 80mm tungsten point on our Vaderstad TopDown in spring 2017 against new competition 80mm tungsten points. The Maxipart® point fitted perfectly and the wear results speak for themselves; we worked over 600 acres in some pretty unforgiving soils and when the competition point had completely failed, the Maxipart® one would have still given another 100 - 150 acres.
Norman Court Contracting (Velcourt)Hampshire/Wiltshire border
Very impressed with these points. We trialed them behind the wheel and elsewhere in a very hard season (Autumn 2018) and they kept their shape really well. We've used genuine before and they go down to about 2" across after about 900 to 1,000 acres but yours kept the full 80mm throughout. We get a maximum of 1,200 acres out of genuine points, yours did a good 1,500.
A W Neish (Richard Cripps)Warminster, Wiltshire
The fitment and retention of shape of the point is great. Although no direct comparison was done I would say that we've got pretty much double the wear out of the Maxipart® point compared to any other tungsten point we've used before. Also that's in the Summer/Autumn of 2018 which was an extremely hard year. It has really helped with down time. I've been really impressed with them.
David Foot Ltd (Leigh West)Weymouth, Dorset
The Maxipart® Allrounder points have done at least as many acres as the genuine Kockling tungsten points, probably more. The reason I really like them though is that the Maxipart® ones are much better priced.
E W Davies Farms Ltd (Jeremy Durrant)Nr Braintree, Essex
I interspersed your Maxipart® legs and genuine Sumo legs on my DTS at the same time in order to get fair wear rates. The Sumo ones have completely worn out but the Maxipart® ones have loads of tungsten left and wear left in them. Maxipart® will be my leg of choice going forward.
Lightwater Farms Ltd (Jonathan Fryatt)Ripon, North Yorkshire
The fitment is perfect and the wear rate is great. I've only done 500 acres on a 3m Xpress but if you painted them purple again they'd be like new. This is very impressive as the Autumn of 2018 was incredibly hard so I'm really happy. I didn't trial them against genuine which I had used before but I know that they'd be at least as good.
S P Miles (Steve Miles)Nr Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire
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