Spincraft Wins the Aviation Customer Focus Achievement Award
Spincraft is thrilled to be recognized for excellence in the United Kingdom and the international aviation industry as the winner of the Aviation Customer Focus Achievement category at the 2024 Aviation Industry Awards UK! We were even a finalist in the Service Provider of the Year category.
On September 17th, Managing Director Don Murray from our Newcastle facility represented us at Awards Night at the International Convention Centre in Birmingham. Congratulations to all of this year’s award recipients!
Meet the 2024 Winners: Click Here
✈ Our Aviation Expertise: Click Here
Delivering Complex Metal Formed Aviation Solutions through Customer Intimacy
Spincraft prides itself on establishing and maintaining deep organizational relationships with our aviation customers to deliver critical cost-effective solutions. Our team achieves this by leveraging best-in-class metal forming technologies, partnering with industry-leading consortiums and collaborating closely with our customers throughout all steps of the development cycle.
One aviation customer Spincraft has excelled at building a working connection with is Airbus. This connection aided in Airbus selecting Spincraft to support their ZEROe aircraft development by manufacturing prototype domes for the aircraft’s cryogenic storage tank. Spincraft’s extensive experience within the space launch sector has positioned us as true manufacturing partners in the aviation market as companies seek the best way to store hydrogen in future commercial aircraft designs. Our UK-based operation in Newcastle upon Tyne is now producing single-piece spun and machined domes for this initiative.
Spincraft’s history of involvement with Airbus initially stems from our US-based facilities. The Spincraft site in Wisconsin has been providing single-piece lipskins for the inlets on the A320neo family for almost 10 years. With our US-based teammates gaining trust by delivering high-quality lipskin solutions, it was a natural progression for Airbus and our UK-based facility to partner up as they began transcending into the need for domes.
The ZEROe initiative represents Airbus’s commitment to putting into service the world’s first commercial zero-emissions aircraft by 2035. One of the most important and innovative technologies needed to achieve this goal is the in-flight storage of liquid hydrogen fuel. With an incredibly hands-on approach during the design phase, Spincraft manufactured the first tank dome hardware to support Airbus’s development efforts in this area.
The design phase was an extremely collaborative process. The customer trusted and relied heavily on our advanced engineering team to meet the required design criteria of this solution. Although this was new territory for the customer, this is a solution Spincraft has extensive experience producing for the space launch vehicle market. From here, we were able to agree on a commercial agreement, manage the supply chain and execute the first manufactured prototype for the customer. Our involved approach enabled Airbus to navigate and understand all stages of their development cycle for the hydrogen storage system. The way Spincraft utilized conventional and innovative methods across a range of specialty equipment to deliver unmatched, complex solutions was a key contributor to the success of the developmental program.
With a global network of engineering collaboration, Spincraft hosted the Airbus ZEROe team at our Massachusetts, Wisconsin and Newcastle locations. These visits were an opportunity to continue cultivating our strong relationship while showcasing our facilities, including our facility that was built for the serial production of Airbus lipskins. Through these onsite, face-to-face opportunities, the customer was able to gain familiarity with the individuals they were working with and allowed them an inside look at the production side of the house. While onsite, the Airbus team witnessed the manufacturing process of some of the first domes that will be used in the hydrogen aviation tank demonstrators. The cross-collaboration continued with our Business Development, Engineering and Production staff visiting Airbus.
Airbus has been very complimentary of the way Spincraft has supported this critical program development. On March 14, 2024, Spincraft was recognized at the Airbus Detail Parts Partner (D2P) Awards in France, scoring among the top suppliers and receiving an award under the “Specialist” category. This recognition solidifies our contributions and superior performance over the last year, specifically noting our great collaboration, delivery and performance by the Spincraft WI team on A320neo lipskins and Spincraft UK’s proactive approach to developing prototype hardware solutions for the ZEROe initiative.
This award is a direct result of Spincraft’s proven track record of sustaining operational reliability, delivering on our commitments, cultivating customer intimacy and supplying cost-effective advanced metal forming solutions.
Some additional positive feedback we received from the customer was,
Focusing on relationships with aviation customers has always been a priority for Spincraft. We are excited to deliver a component that is critical for making the future of hydrogen-powered flight a reality. This work reflects our North East location’s evolution into a leading advanced metal forming solutions provider in the European aerospace and defense markets. This contract marks a key milestone in bringing our space dome heritage to the high-growth aviation market. Spincraft’s leading capabilities in design collaboration and CNC spin-forming have positioned us well to support Airbus development efforts that shape the future of aviation and the world’s first zero-emission commercial aircraft.
