Greenwoods
were selected to design and deliver 110 control cabinets for the project.
The purpose-built cabinets house sensitive electronic control and
monitoring units for ultra-high vacuum pumps, gauges and other specialised
equipment used on the Diamond project.
On average, the company builds up to 100 such cabinets per month
for telecoms customers. There is also a dedicated cabinet building
facility located at its base in Birmingham, which enables it to
build, test, service and commission cabinets built onsite.
The Diamond control cabinets contain a wide array of specialist
units that were delivered to Greenwoods from Germany and the United
States. The cabinets were built in-house at Greenwoods with a three-week
build and three-week testing process for each of the 110 cabinets.
The testing process was driven by the necessity for the sophisticated
control modules to be ready to use when delivered. For Greenwoods,
the project reinforces its position as a leading provider of bespoke
solutions and not just to telecommunications and datacoms companies
but elsewhere too.
“With a project of this magnitude, quality was everything”,
commented Greenwoods Project Director, Martin Townsend. “We
are extremely proud and excited to have played such an integral
role in one of the most important scientific projects in recent
years”.
Diamond Light Source represents a huge opportunity for scientific
development in the UK and elsewhere. Ensuring that the quality of
the materials and solutions that contribute to Diamond was of paramount
importance to the success of the project. Greenwoods’ combination
of technical expertise and strict adherence to the numerous quality
procedures meant it was among a small number of firms capable of
providing what was needed for the project.
The Diamond synchrotron is the largest scientific facility to be
built in the United Kingdom in nearly thirty years, with construction
costs estimated at around £250 million. The facility can be
compared to a series of ‘super microscopes’, which allows
scientists to view matter and materials they could not otherwise
view. These super microscopes will enable investigation into areas
such as the human genome, new medicines, pollutants and complex
electronic materials.
Notes
to Editors
Project Diamond is a synchrotron light source. This can be best
described as a ‘super microscope’ housed in a doughnut
shaped building half a kilometre in circumference and covering the
area of 5 football pitches. The microscope produces incredibly intense
light beams that can penetrate deep inside all kinds of matter,
this allows scientists to view the properties and characteristics
of numerous forms of matter and material they would not otherwise
be able to see. This project is critical to scientific progress,
allowing scientists from the UK and abroad to answer fundamental
questions about everything from the building blocks of life to the
origin of our planet. Project Diamond is due for completion early
2007. Diamond Light Source is a part-Government funded company created
to operate the Diamond site.
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