Rolls Royce Wet Process Area

The Rolls-Royce facility at the Precision Casting Facility (PCF) in Derby produces Aero engine fan blades. The Wet Process Area cleans the blades in a heated caustic solution to remove all debris from the casting process. The existing Autoclave machinery used in this process was to undergo a refurbishment and as such the area was to undergo a major transformation to meet the latest HSE standards as well as improve the process flow through the factory.

The project required the supply of a design, project management and build team to perform the refurbishment of the existing wet process area of the post cast operations. It required the decommissioning of pits, the removal of all redundant services, the floor relaying and tilling through the tiles & grout with a high tolerance to Caustic solutions, new drains installing, new gantry crane, a bunded section to hold all process equipment and an extraction system. All walls and ceiling after the removal of the redundant services were to be prepared and painted.

Upon the arrival of the refurbished process machinery there was to be the installation of all Mechanical and Electrical services.

EI.WHS were selected as Main Contractor and were also Electrical, Mechanical and Civils Designer.

The project was completed in 4 stages:

  • Strip out existing plant, machinery and craneage. Extend building out into service yard by 4M.
  • Fill existing Process pits with concrete
  • Install new M&E infrastructure and internal buildings.
  • Install new crane, in-load new machines with final connections & commissioning.

The electrical services system included the diversion of existing LV supplies from substation and containment systems throughout the new shop floor layout. A new busbar system was installed to supply all electrical machine loads. The mechanical services systems include new Air ring mains, Steam & Condense, water supply and drainage. Comfort air conditioning and fresh air was installed in enclosed occupied areas.

Rolls-Royce Plc had placed orders for the existing production machinery to be refurbished. The project had to meet these machinery delivery dates. The infrastructure/service program was structured to meet the new production machinery delivery dates rather than meet the ideal construction phases. This brought its own complications but through detailed planning and negotiations the project was delivered on time and all new production machinery delivery dates met.


Project Team

Client: Rolls-Royce Plc
Main Contractor: EI.WHS Ltd
M&E Contractor: EI.WHS Ltd
Structural Engineer: Ward Cole
Project Value: £0.35m