Spotlight on Exhibitor – Top Seiko
Monday, 29 April 2019
What will you be showcasing at Ceramics UK?
Because we usually manufacture ceramics parts as customs order, we will showcase our samples including new ones. They will show you what we can do to ceramics with machining and how skilful our workers are.
What technologies or materials do you specialise in?
We are specializing in CNC machining of ceramics and ultra-hard metals. Because those materials are very hard and brittle to the machine, the know-how we have been acquiring from experiences is the most important and makes our company different from other numbers of processing companies.
If visitors should know one thing about your company and experience, what would it be?
That we can machine Aluminium Nitride even when the shape is very complex. Because the powder of the material is mainly made in Japan, we believe we have superiority not only in the techniques but also in the cost and the lead time as a Japanese company. If there are companies looking for suppliers which can process complex-shaped components of Aluminium Nitride, we are willing to offer you a quote shortly.
What might surprise people about your work and applications with advanced materials?
We think people will be surprised by our masterpiece, the Quartz Colosseum. That was machined from a quartz block with a 5-axis machining centre and it took 96 hours to finish. The point you should focus on about the Colosseum is the side holes. We drilled the holes by rotating the table of the machine and doing this without making any cracks need very careful techniques.
“Seiko” is a Japanese word meaning “precision machining”. Your aim is to become the top precision machining and manufacturing company in the world. What sets you apart from your competitors?
We are proud of our processing technology to make complex shapes and manufacture such components greatly elaborately, and it makes our company different from competitors. Especially our skilled workers, knowledgeable programmers and tools designed by ourselves are integrant to compose our technology.
You specialise in ultra-hard materials including advanced ceramics, glasses, refractory metals, and newly developed high-performance materials like composite materials. What materials excite you the most?
As I mentioned above, Aluminium Nitride is the material that excites us the most because we have superiority in that material. Also, because we have established the know-how to process Aluminium Nitride and still seeking techniques to make more complex components, we are waiting for helping you with your difficult problems.
You have expertise in product development support, helping customers get their projects right from the outset. Can you tell us about the innovative products you have been involved with?
Top Seiko has focused on helping our customers’ product R&D. One of the recent examples we involved in is JAXA’s project. JAXA, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency were considering changing the material of one of rocket engine components from heat-resistant metal to Silicon Carbide (SiC.) Their purpose of the replacement is to make the part lightweight and to improve the heat resistance. Even though SiC is one of the hardest ceramics, and the shape of the components is three-dimensional and very complex, we achieved to process it. We believe that our work could have elevated the technological innovation for space venture.