Brass instrument surface finishing

For musical instruments companies

THE COMPANY

The client is a manufacturer of mouthpieces and brass instruments based in Europe. They specialize in high-value mouthpieces made of brass and gold or silver-plated. The organization is always seeking technologies to improve the quality of their products and overcome challenges in providing perfect mouthpieces, free of defects.

THE PROBLEM

Before adopting GPAINNOVA’s solution, the customer used to carry out manual polishing with brushes, felts, and polishing compounds in a manual workstation. Besides being significantly resource-demanding, these procedures were not cost-efficient and led to a high rate of defective parts, resulting in a lack of quality in the final product.

Manual polishing, as an abrasive method using brushes, felts, and polishing pastes, resulted in inconsistent finishes between batches and a high risk of deformation of the pieces, leading to alterations in geometry and size. Additionally, it incurred high labor costs and required a significant amount of time for polishing.

THE GOAL

The company was seeking to enhance the production productivity and quality of their brass instruments. The customer needed to polish the pieces to achieve higher quality and a longer lifespan. The polishing target was to achieve a mirror surface finishing. As some of the mouthpieces were laser engraved, the surface finishing process needed to preserve the original design without any alterations.

THE SOLUTION

After conducting multiple tests, GPAINNOVA successfully met the technical surface specifications while achieving the lowest total process time and cost. These specifications encompassed high-gloss polishing of the external surface of the mouthpieces, maintaining the original geometry, preserving laser engraved letters or signs, and enhancing the quality of the silver or gold plating.

Thanks to the innovative DLyte solution, the customer replaced the former process, which involved manual buffing and a polishing time of 10 minutes per piece, with a new method capable of treating 40 parts in just 10 minutes. In other words, DLyte’s system is 40 times faster and more efficient than the previous one.

TECHNICAL BENEFITS

01. Geometry and tolerance preservation & homogeneous results across the piece
02. Best-in-class concerning surface roughness (Ra under 0.1 micrometers)
03. Stable results among different batches within the electrolyte lifespan
04. Longer lifespan for treated parts
05. Logo, name or signs preserved

OPERATIONAL BENEFITS

01. Reduced footprint
02. Time and cost reduction
03. Exposure of workers during process and maintenance
04. Handling and storage of media
05. No need for multistep processes
06. Easy waste management