Positive shift in awareness of sustainable processes for engineering manufacturing at MACH2026

A month on from our 7th consecutive MACH exhibition and we’ve had time to process the enquiries and look at the big picture of this year’s show experience for us.

With official figures from the MTA confirming the total attendees to be 26,000 for the 5 days, combined with 40% of those identified as being in senior roles with buying power, it was clearly a very successful week in many ways for exhibitors, attendees and the organisers.

We benefitted from impressive enquiry levels from visitors to the stand across all of our products. It was great to welcome many existing customers looking to add further component collectors to their machine shop floor or wishing to find out more about our other machine offerings after seeing what else was on stand.

Rotary component collector models featured on partner stands Citizen Machinery & Star Micronics generated considerable interest with customers getting a clear idea of how the functionality can complement the lathes each company offers.

The big standout for us however, was a progressive forward shift since MACH2024 in sustainability knowledge and awareness of swarf handling equipment. With a higher number of environmentally conscious company owners & employees than ever before coming to our stand already armed with an understanding of what they need & why. There is greater awareness of the implications of not putting more sustainable practices & processes in place. This was also demonstrated by visits from a number of companies with what we would call 'bigger needs' and therefore enquiring about multiple machines for large scale production lines.

In addition, there was a marked increase in people visiting our stand who hold specific sustainability & compliance roles within companies who are looking to drive sustainability-focussed changes. Managers and executives whose responsibility is geared to optimising resources, meeting key stakeholders demands for profitability, minimising environmental and climate risks, as well as ensuring there is regulation compliance and increased traceability.

The financial implications for businesses not operating any kind of swarf management processes are greater now than they have ever been.

Key concerns for engineering manufacturing include pollution problems, potential fines, storage space issues, higher recycling costs, poor returns on scrap metal and money wasted throwing away expensive cutting fluids.

Some key examples of this being:

  • Environment Agency factory inspections & pollution checks can often result in fines for companies if they are found to have cutting fluid leaking from swarf skips stored outside leaking into the environment causing a pollution hazard.
  • Scrap metal recyclers will charge penalties for contaminated brass, as this has to be treated before it can be recycled to ensure less than 2% moisture.
  • Everything costs more - from skips and recycler pick ups to coolants and cutting oils.

With facts and figures such as one briquetting machine reducing swarf volume by up to 90% | one swarf spinner recovering up to 98% of coolant fluid for reuse | briquetted or spun swarf having an increased recycling value of up to 50% - adopting new processes or upgrading existing swarf management solutions has never been so desirable or so easy in engineering manufacturing!

If you weren't one of the lucky one's able to visit us at MACH2026 and are interested in how these products can help you tackle your 'green agenda' & relieve some of the pressure imposed by continuously escalating raw material prices, please contact us for more information.