R A Chilton Ltd
Copper Electroplating
Bob Chilton started up his electroforming business in 1974 in a small shed behind the house, supplying a former customer of EHE, and making electroplated jewellery. The business gradually expanded into precision engineering and by 1987 outgrew its home.
An industrial site was purchased upon which 5000 sq ft of industrial units were built and in mid 1987 the business moved into a 1000 sq ft unit with the remainder being let out. The electroplating and precision engineering business expanded into the space available, and more units were built, enabling the subcontract precision engineering to be separated from the electroplating.
The precision engineering business - now Tarvin Precision was sold to two of its employees allowing Bob Chilton to concentrate on the Electroplating of Air Bearing Spindles and a recently developed process for manufacturing ICPMS Cones.
The ICPMS Cones business also grew, and was sold to three of its employees. We began investing in more equipment for electroplating Air Bearing Spindles.
An opportunity came up for Bob Chilton to acquire more Factory Units in a different location near his new home. The second site was used to manufacture new equipment and enable the capacity increase required at the main production site in Tarvin.
The business was restructured into a limited company in July 2009 owned and managed by Wendy Chilton. The R&D was transferred to the second site under the control of Bob Chilton. Much of the equipment at the main site was replaced and improved and a back up production capability is established at the new site.
ICPMS Cones expanded into Units 1-3 leaving Unit 4 vacant next door to us. We could not miss this opportunity. Work began on fitting out the new unit. The additional much needed space was utilised to separate the machining from the electroplating, and improve the work flow.
In July 2013 we installed a brand new Dugard 100 CNC lathe to ease the load on our old Dugard Eagle 10.
Electricity prices continue to increase, and so we also installed 17kW of solar panels on the roof to reduce our energy costs.
2016 was heavy on the R&D for Bob and Wendy with development of the Copper process and installation of an Electroless Nickel Plating Line.
Development of the titanium cleaning process took place throughout 2017, with the copper plating on titanim added in 2018, and the finished line installed in a dedicated laboriatory in 2019
All we can say about this is thank goodness for solar panels, we wish we had more.
The current R&D is a culmination of decades of background work from Bob testing new additives. We are confident the resistance to annealing in our newest copper offering will take our customers spindle speeds up to their new target levels.
Bob Chilton graduated from Queen Mary College London with a BSc in Chemistry. Bob started his Career at Rolls Royce (Aero Engine Division) as one of 150 Graduate Trainees in 1970. Whilst Bob was on a 2 week training assignment at a subsidiary (EHE Runcorn) Rolls Royce went into receivership. The graduate trainees were made redundant, however Bob kept a low profile and continued on his 2 week placement for another 4 years until EHE also closed down. Bob started up his electroforming business at home in 1974. Bob is definitely not retired, and continues to work on the more interesting research and development projects, leaving the boring business management to Wendy.
Wendy Chilton graduated from Warwick University with an MEng in Manufacturing Engineering in 1997. Wendy worked at Massey Ferguson for 5 years firstly on a graduate training programme, then moving on to Cell Support Engineer for the Machine Shops. Whilst at Massey Ferguson Wendy completed her training and achieved CEng MIMechE. Wendy left Massey Ferguson to have a family, and returned home to Tarvin in 2005 working part time in the family business. Wendy became major shareholder and took over the full time management of the business in July 2009. Wendy was awarded FIMF with the Institute of Materials Finishing in October 2016