> TrainingClasses of one, two, three or four days duration are offered in the following subjects, but this list is not exhaustive:

Spring material properties and quality requirements
Subjects covered: Mechanical properties, Quality requirements for spring materials, selecting materials for relaxation, fatigue and corrosion resistance, selecting spring manufacturing process and why. Process route for the manufacture of spring wire.

Optimisation of Springmaking Processes
Subjects covered: Wire and strip production, spring forming (hot or cold), Heat treatment (theory and practice), grinding, shot peening, prestressing and corrosion protection. The course concludes with a summary of how material properties change in each process and thereby which order processes should be carried out.

Spring Design
Design of compression, extension, torsion, disc, spiral and leaf springs at levels 1 or 2 - i.e. basic principles or more advanced topics including optimisation to reduce weight. Included in this course is a clear definition of who take responsibility for spring designs.

Level 1 subjects: Selecting materials, basic design formulae for rate and stress in compression, extension and torsion springs, use of design software for verification of customer’s drawings.

Level 2 subjects: Selecting materials, basic formulae for conical, rectangular section compression, wavy washers and disc springs, use of software for design of non-standard springs and for the optimisation of compression springs, extension spring design for hooks, torsion spring design for legs and use in the unwind direction, spiral and leaf springs will be discussed briefly if required.

How to Diagnose Spring Failures
Subjects covered: mechansims of spring failure, and how to diagnose them, underlying causes of failure, a logical approach to reducing the risk of future failures.
If any of the above subjects, or combination of subjects, is of interest, then please contact:
m.hayes@springexpert.co.uk for further information.

Each of these subjects is available to be given within your factory or nearby hotel in English or poor French. When English is not the first language of delegates, it is important that Spring Expert delivers courses in good clear, accent free English, largely free of colloquial or profane langauage and also free of large and difficult words like "colloquialisms and profanity".
If you have an interest in one or more of the above subjects, a draft syllabus and price would be offered for your consideration.

The feasiblity of spring training via Skype and distant learning courses have been investigated, and to date no satisfactory means to offer courses in this way has been identified..

Courses in the UK are usually of one day duration, sometimes given at level 1 in the morning and at level 2 in the afternoon. In Europe the courses are more usually given over two full days, but elsewhere in the world they are of three or four days duration to minimise the impact of the air fare on costs. These longer courses are often given either side of the weekend so that the tutor gets a Sunday off and doesn't get too tired on the last day. Each day usually lasts eight hours with short breaks morning and afternoon and half an hour for lunch.

News
The last course given by Spring Expert was the third repeat of a course - a refresher for those who attended 4 years ago and new for new employees for a company that is 50% larger than in January 2014.. It was clear that those who attended the previous course wanted to advance their knowledge further, whilst those attending for the first time had questions of less sophistication. Quite often the questions asked were ones for which they already had a good idea of the answer, but they wanted to hear the opinion of an independent person so that they could contrast their knowledge and experience with that of a spring expert.

The last courses given were in USA, Canada, Spain, China,Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. The next course booked will be in Scandinavia. There is capacity for courses in the first half of 2020, but not so much for the second half of the year if long haul flights are required.

Mark attended Wire 2018 in Düsseldorf. He was very pleased to meet up with friends from all over the world at the show, and looks forward to meeting them again at Wire 2020 in December.