Amateur Astronomer Builds Observatory Using Chambrelan's Heavy Duty Slides

When Mike, a partner in an engineering firm and amateur astronomer, decided to build an observatory in his back garden using Chambrelan's heavy duty slides, we knew it was going to be a good story to follow up.  After four years of meticulous planning, the observatory is in the final build stage, with the sliding roof being the most essential aspect of the project.

However this is no ordinary observatory.  Most observatories use two beams supported by a single column to roll back the roof, unfortunately this design has it's draw backs in that the observatory walls can restrict the horizontal view of the sky.  A vertical view is fine, but it means the astronomer must know what he wants to look at before pointing his telescope.

The other observatory design Mike looked at was the classic rotating domed roof, which he felt might be an eye sore in the back of his garden.  So Mike went back to the drawing board and created a design that would not restrict his view of the horizon, allowing him both a horizontal and vertical view of the stars.  By creating an aluminium roof fitted on heavy duty slides, which 'peeled' back the roof, the telescope could be positioned at any angle for greater visibility.

Unfortunately Mike had problems with buying telescopic slides.  The first company he bought them from took his money, but failed to deliver the slides and it was only after he'd gone through his insurance was he able to recoup the money.  However not to be put off, Mike decided to contact Chambrelan.  Having listened to the brief and having discussed Mike's designs the Chambrelan team suggested one of their heaviest duty slides, the E1902.

The E1902 is a three beam zinc plated, nested slide made from carbon steel and because of the design and the materials used, is an extremely heavy duty slide capable of carrying massive loads.  Mike needed a huge amount of extension and opted for a 2000mm with a load capacity of 250kg.

"The new Chambrelan heavy duty slides," confirms Mike, "are exquisite, they're fantastic, a lot more heavy duty than the slides i originally bought.  Wish i'd bought them in the first place."

Fore more information on how Chambrelan heavy duty slides can help transform your build visit www.chambrelan.com 

Quik Corp Adopts Chambrelan's Heavy Duty Slides Across Vehicle Build

Chambrelan's Heavy Duty Slides fully extended

Quik Corp Fire Engineering are specialist vehicle builders, designing and manufacturing a range of specialised fire and emergency equipment for the Australian and South East Asia Market.  By working With Queensland Rural Fire Service, the Australian Department of Defence, New South Wales National Parks, Forestry plantations and mining corporations they have built themselves a reputation for quality and delivery.

Heavy duty slides extend 'Jaws of Life' cutting equipment

So when Quik Corp were commissioned to build a remote fire application used as an airport fire appliance they knew they needed to pack a serious amount of kit into the vehicle.  Based on a 6000L MAN 6x4 chassis, the Remote Fire Appliance was expected to carry everything from heavy duty cutting equipment through to stretchers and essential recovering kit.

Chambrelan's unique Slide & Tilt System

The team of experts quickly decided that a range of heavy duty slides and Chambrelan's unique slide and tilt systems would be used across the build.  The sliding locker housing the stretcher needed to be operated from only side of the vehicle and be fully extended out via Chambrelan's heavy duty slides.  Other essential kit was stored in overhead slide and tilt lockers and was operated by Chambrelan's Slam lock with the Lock in Lock out option.  In addition further road crash rescue equipment mounted on Chambrelan's RA7R 450mm closed length extension which also includes Chambrelan's new slam lock.

Chambrelan's heavy duty slides, linear rails, slam locks and slide and tilt systems are now being used across a number of Quik Corp vehicle builds.

For more information on how any of Chambrelan's heavy duty slides can help develop your application drop us a line www.chambrelan.co.uk 

KME Kovatch Fire Apparatus Takes on Chambrelan Heavy Duty Slides

KME Kovatch incorporate Chamnbrelan Heavy Duty Slides 

Not a spring chicken this story, but nevertheless we hope those of you interested in heavy duty slides on fire trucks might get a little excited.  A while ago Chambrelan breached the US market in that they started supplying heavy duty slides and sliding systems to KME Kovatch, an American manufacturer of specialist vehicles and customised trucks.  For over 6 decades KME Kovatch have built a reputation for quality and reliable delivery and design and build their own chassis, as well as distributing a wide range of commercial chassis.

Smooth pull out / push in sliding system

So when KME started looking at new ways to store and hold essential fire equipment across a range of pumper tankers and airport crash rescue vehicles, they decided to fit Chambrelan's heavy duty RA7R and RA5R's.  

Lower stowage drawer carried on Chambrelan's heavy duty slides

Andrew Yenser, Rescue product manager for KME Kovatch, had this to say on the integration of Chambrelan's heavy duty slides onto their vehicles.  "We were looking for quality and strength; something that was easy to fit and easy to maintain.  That's when Chambrelan's RA5R and RA7R came to our attention.  Their reliability and strength means, as vehicle builders, we can offer additional components to our customers, which otherwise wouldn't have been possible before."

Chambrelan's heavy duty slides in action

As you can imagine importing products, in this instance heavy duty slides, have to face extensive safety tests before they can be incorporated into vehicles and a strict evaluation process for all new products need to be agreed before any supply agreement is reached.  The KME committee, made up of sales reps, purchasers and engineers, looked at things like the materials used, mechanics and engineering and of course a supply chain that isn't going to break.

In this respect Chambrelan had the right heavy duty slides and 50 years of experience in working alongside specialist vehicle builders, what's more as manufacturers they could guarantee supply.

For more information on how Chambrelan can help you with your stowage and heavy duty slides, click here.

Chambrelan Heavy Duty Slides: Better Protection

Due to the WEEE Directive of 2007 certain heavy metal finishes had to be removed from our heavy duty slides and linear rails, forcing the industry to change their protection.  Chambrelan now use a chrome free white zinc plate.

This plate is now provided as the standard Chambrelan finish across the whole range of products utilising carbon steel sections that are produced and refined on site at Chambrelan's Le Havre factory.  The benefits of this system include improved corrosion resistance, amounting to 480 hours of protection against the salt spray test (see pics) before appearance of white rust (more than 5% of surface), which means Chambrelan have more than doubled the amount of protection at no extra cost to the customer.  This treatment also improves the protection of the appearance of red rust, by roughly 12% – from 600 hours to 672.

The zin plating also adds structural strength to the slide, providing extra rigidity and making them more ruggedised than ever before.  As a company Chambrelan is dedicated to continually improving their range of products, whether it's introducing new slides or improving on their most popular designs and a huge amount of investment has been made in the drawing, refining, cleaning, annealing and machining of their slides, which all combine to improve the life expectancy of the slide, whilst maintaining a competitive price point.

For further information on any of Chambrelan products please visit www.chambrelan.com

Head Farrier Uses Heavy Duty Slides For Mobile Forge

As head Farrier for the Great British Endurance team and one of only three farriers chosen for the Beijing Olympics, Kelvin Lymer is the Christian Louboutin of horse shoes, the problem is, his customers are generally to be found wandering in the most inhospitable places and therefore he knew he needed to design and build a one piece mobile forge and workshop, operated by heavy duty slides, that could take him into the wilds.

Being a farrier means I need to be out and about," said Kelvin.  "It also means I need to carry a huge amount of kit around with me.  The only option was to carry this equipment in a vehicle strong enough to manage such heavy loads, whilst having the 'off-road' capabilities to access the most inhospitable terrain."

Having chosen a Landrover Discovery 4, a bruisingly big brute of a vehicle that sports a 3.0 litre, 255hp diesel engine with a four corner air suspension and Landrover's unique Terrain Response as standard, the next problem was the design of the stainless steel pod and the sliding movement to extend and retract it from the vehicle.

With the help of the boys from Stainless & Alloy products Limited, headed up by Jeremy Hughes-Hubbold, the pod needed to be capable of being slid from the back of the vehicle and then 'unfolded' to deliver a fully operational forge.  Space was always the biggest problem for the team, closely followed by the load capacity of the pod, but with over 30 years of experience in

"It was like," confirms Jeremy, "Squeezing 10 gallons of water into a single pint."

The pod, made of stainless steel is designed to house all the kit a farrier might need, including a forge, an anvil and grinding stones to name a few and to house it all in one, took a lot of trial and effort, but once designed, the next problem was to make the pod retractable.  That's when the team decided to contact Chambrelan UK, manufacturers and distributors of heavy duty slides and sliding systems.

Chambrelan advised the only slide capable of carrying these extreme loads was the E1700 slide, a zinc coated, three beam nested slide, which uses reinforced ball bearings to deliver a soft and smooth sliding 100% extension.  Easy to fit and easy to maintain, the E1700 is one of the preferred heavy duty slides used by the defence and emergency services and therefore has a good track record and pedigree.

Suffice to say the project was an enormous success and Kelvin is now designing and building these pods for other farriers.

For more information on a full range of Chambrelan's heavy duty slides and linear rails please visit www.chambrelan.co.uk 

SEM Fire and Rescue Uses Chambrelan's Heavy Duty Slides

SEM Fire and Rescue - sporting Chambrelan's heavy duty slides

SEM Fire and Rescue, the specialist vehicle builders based in Australia, recently won a contract from the Country Fire Authority (CFA) to build a Technical Rescue Vehicle (Hino FM 2630) for front line fire and rescue alerts, which could also include water rescue, control and a range of fire and rescue operations including forest fire, house fire and commercial properties in and around Australia.  Complete with Chambrelan's heavy duty sliding systems, this build was something that took our breath away when we first saw the designs, but when we saw the photographs, we were blown away.

Heavy duty slides carrying tool boards and kit drawers

You see, this is no ordinary rescue vehicle and has been designed as a transportable pod or module, which is dismounted from the chassis and thereby be operated as a stand alone unit, encompassing all the necessary equipment relevant for that particular operation.

By using a massive hino A09C-TT turbo charged intercooled 6 cylinder diesel engine, the pod is lifted and dismounted using the multi-lift LHS 250, which has enormous lifting capabilities up to 17,000kg.  The module itself has been designed to carry a series of storage compartments, work benches and sliding generator as well as a series of slide and tilt pull out drawer systems, that deliver essential kit to the operator, quickly and easily.

A range of Chambrelan's heavy duty slides have been integrated into the build and were chosen for their high strength and extension, as well as being easy to fit and easy to maintain.

Work benches and tool drawers extending out

We caught up with Jeremy Binnington, Director of Chambrelan UK, to find out a little more about the build as well as finding out how growth in the South East Asian market is faring.

"It's going well, as you know we've been stocking Australia quietly now for about a year and in that time we've come across some very interesting applications."

By doubling their commitment to the Australian market Chambrelan continues to lead the way in the development of sliding systems for heavy duty applications in the mining, fire and emergency and defence markets.

For more information on these or other Chambrelan heavy duty slides and linear rails, please visit www.chambrelan.co.uk 

Chambrelan Heavy Duty Slides Used Down Under

Multi-drive technology, the leading Australia manufacturer of multi-drive vehicles, has recently announced a collaboration with Chambrelan UK.  The order, which comes from Rio Tinto, one of the largest mining companies in the world.  Commissioned to carry out rail maintenance on a 400 kilometre line in one of the most extreme desert climates in the world, namely the Pilbara Region of North Western Australia, these vehicles needed to carry enough equipment to manage the long haul.

Using a seriously beefed up Land Cruiser - the MDT 5750kg GVM Model with 2500kg load capacity, boasts another drive axle and uses a torque management power divider, making it able to tackle the most extreme conditions without any wind-ups or spinning of axles, even when it's carrying 2.5tons.

In addition the vehicles will be carrying specialised lightweight custom built trailers, which have been tailor made to store the right equipment.  Using Chambrelan heavy duty slides and linear rails these trailers are packed with tool boards, storage draws and compartments each carrying vital engineering equipment.

For more information on how Chambrelan products can help you, please contact Bruce Elliott from Integrated Equipment on +61 (0) 353 673 513 or visit www.integratedequipment.co.au.

For UK based enquiries you can contact Chambrelan directly by visiting www.chambrelan.co.uk