TWI

TWI

Company Profile

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TWI is one of Europe’s largest independent research and technology organisations with over 50 years’ of experience. It supports an international membership across: energy, defence, healthcare, transport sectors. TWI has over 750 staff with over 120 qualified materials scientists and engineers with academic, research and industrial qualifications delivering technical consultancy and R&D, training, business support across the life-cycle of manufacturing. TWI offers a complete service from idea generation, product development and introduction, recycling and re-use. TWI has proven technical excellence in materials science and the development of advanced welding techniques, whilst several of TWI’s past inventions are being used regularly within industry.

Expertise related to the project

Previously TWI has participated in more than 300 large-scale collaborative projects, either as a participant or coordinator, including several Framework projects. TWI offers expertise in metallurgy, materials selection and characterisation with a wide range of testing facilities to support this work. With experience in both materials processing and the automotive sector TWI can offer technical expertise and support to the project.

Technical person(s) working on the project

Dr Kasra Sotoudeh, PhD in Materials Science. Section manager of the Stainless Steel & Non-Ferrous Alloys section (SSN) and is currently working on superduplex stainless steel and non-ferrous alloys and their failure mechanisms. He has published a number of papers and presented them both in the UK and internationally. He has experience in teaching, laboratory demonstrations and light weight alloys characterisation. He will be the Project Coordinator due to his broad knowledge in aluminium alloys and its related processes.

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Mr. Mike Gittos. BSc, MSc, MIM3, SenMWeldI, CEng. Mike joined TWI in 1974, after gaining first and master’s degrees at Manchester University. Mike is a world renowned metallurgist who manages many of TWI’s higher profile failure investigations including those assessing significant damage to high value assets. He is an expert on dissimilar metal welding. His main areas of research have related to aspects of joining aluminium, copper, titanium and nickel alloys. Currently, he is extensively involved with consultancy work including failure analysis of a wide range of non-ferrous materials and is a Consultant in the TWI Metallurgy, Corrosion & Surfacing Technology Group.

Dr David Griffiths, PhD in Metallurgy is a project leader in the Stainless Steels and Non-Ferrous alloys section at TWI. He completed his PhD in ‘Formability of Magnesium Alloys’ at the University of Manchester in October 2014 before joining TWI the same year. He has published papers in technical journals and presented them at international conferences and notably has won the Materials Science and Technology literature review prize in 2014, for his review ‘Understanding Improved Formability in Magnesium Rare Earth Alloys’.

Main role within the project

Material characterisation of the alloys using several techniques commonly used in their facilities: Chemical analysis of the alloys, weldability and performance assessment, microstructural characterisation and also mechanical properties study including formability. All the experiments will be reviewed and reported accordingly. TWI will also help with dissemination of the project findings through media such as the TWI youtube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/twiltd). As Project coordinator TWI will help steer the committee towards meeting EU deadlines and coordinating work between partners.

Benefits expected from the participation in the project

The main benefits TWI Ltd. perceives are:

  • Expertise developed in HSP material testing
  • Enhanced knowledge in automotive materials and part production
  • Contribute towards the development of an environmentally friendly technology.
  • Opportunity to work with within a wider network of partners.