Billington Structures Ltd invests in beam bending facility

Billington Structures Ltd has recently acquired technology that extends its capabilities for producing cambered beams. The equipment, a P-800A profile bending machine made by Dutch company Dynobend, is located at Billington’s facility in Yate, and can be used to pre-camber a steel beam, or to straighten beams that may require it.

Pre-cambers in beams are used in structural steelwork to compensate for any deflection that may occur due to the load placed on the beam during construction or end use of the building.

The new machine has the capacity to bend universal beams of section size 838x292x176UB. It can exert a force of 1625kN (165 tonnes), and will typically be used to form deflections of 15 to 35mm. Not only this; it is mobile so that it can be moved to different parts of the factory, therefore reducing the need for excessive materials handling.

The equipment was purchased principally to provide cambered beams for Billington’s project located at Merchant Square in London, for which some 450 cambered beams are required. However, this machine, along with the cambering machine already operational at the company’s Barnsley site, will be incorporated in the everyday production process. This brings about the benefits of greater control over quality and consistency, and cost and time savings over sub-contracting the operation.