Rock West Boosts Capacity With Investment in New Custom-Built Filament Winder

Rock West Composites has announced their investment in a new, custom-built filament winder that will help the company meet the growing demand for its products. The filament winder significantly increases Rock West's manufacturing capacity while also improving efficiency and schedule flexibility.
Rock West Composites

Rock West Composites, a California company specializing in manufacturing products made of composite materials and online sales including carbon fiber tubing and prepregs, is pleased to announce a significant investment in their production capacity by way of a new, custom-built filament winder. The state-of-the-art machine is a six-spindle, four-axis winder with advanced programming and operating capabilities. The machine boosts Rock West Composites’ manufacturing operations in response to an increasing demand for filament wound product. The company has nearly doubled its capacity to meet demand.

Rock West Composites’ filament winder utilizes four axes of motion to accomplish precise fiber placement. The machine also features a programmable doctor blade for accurate control of resin, a 36-tow capacity resin bath to facilitate rapid material buildup, and a digitally controlled resin bath heating system to guarantee optimum fiber wet out. Ensuring everything works as it should is an advanced pattern simulation software package that makes generating and viewing winding patterns both precise and efficient.

"We are excited about this additional equipment to support our customer base," said Dave Erickson, VP and General Manager of Rock West Composites’ Utah facility. "Increased filament winding capability enables us to remain extremely competitive as we continue to serve a variety of industries, including Aerospace and Defense, Scientific Research, Oil & Gas, and more."

Erickson went on to explain that the new filament winder should increase cost efficiency for some programs by reducing the labor cost per part. It also supports Rock West Composites' strategy of offering customers commercial pricing on high volume production runs. Finally, the machine and its software make it possible for the company to increase capacity and flexibility simultaneously to better meet customer scheduling requirements.

More about RWC's filament winding capacity can be found at www.rockwestcomposites.com.

About Rock West Composites

Rock West Composites is a California company specializing in composite products used by a variety of customers representing numerous industries. The company offers carbon fiber and other composites, along with a full range of composite products including tubing, plates, sheets, prepregs, and complementary materials. Rock West also offers custom products and services that include product development, engineering, prototyping, and manufacturing. Their manufacturing processes cover the full range of the latest technologies and methodologies for filament winding, roll wrap, resin infusion, bladder molding, and modified closed mold processes. They operate facilities both in Salt Lake City, Utah and San Diego, California.

CONTACT:

Julia Willis, Marketing Director
​Phone: 858-537-6260
​Email: marketing@1rockwest.com
​Website: www.rockwestcomposites.com

Source: Rock West Composites

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