Fuji Continues to Expand Utility of Computed Radiography in Non-Destructive Testing

December 3, 1997

STAMFORD, CT — Fuji NDT Systems (FNDT) has expanded its industrial CR site installations to Bell Helicopter Textron of Ft. Worth, TX, and Alloyweld Inspection Company, Inc. of Bensenville, IL, announced Doug Hackradt, national sales manager at FNDT. Fuji Photo, Ltd., the pioneer in Computed Radiography, is the parent company of FNDT.

CR will be used for inspection of welding and light manufacturing at these industrial sites as they join larger companies, such as McDonnell Douglas, in moving away from chemical-based X-ray processes and into digital imaging.

"These are key expansions for the NDT group at Fuji," Hackradt said. "They are examples of the numerous applications of CR and will be a big step for both Bell and Alloyweld in their efforts to move into digital technologies and position themselves on the cutting edge of technology."

Alloyweld Inspection Company is the first independent testing lab to install CR. With projects that require inspection of several million small pieces, as well as some weldments, alloy castings, and electronic components, Alloyweld considered real-time X-ray as well as scanning acoustic microscopy before deciding to invest in Fuji CR.

"Nothing compared with the sensitivity we experienced with CR," said Ed Piecko, owner of Alloyweld. "The progression of Fuji CR into the industrial field has been a quantum leap for companies like ours that perform radiography. Real time X-ray has been coming along so slowly as a means of testing, but with Fuji CR the sensitivity of digitizing the image was phenomenal, not to mention the savings in time and costs of film, chemicals and labor. What used to take four or five shots, now only takes one or two. We're looking at double or triple productivity for each machine."

Glen Rodriguez, product assurance engineer and NDI specialist at Bell Helicopter Textron, a renowned manufacturer of military and commercial helicopters, concurred that not only is the cost savings substantial with Fuji CR, but the quality of the images is superior to other CR systems.

"By implementing CR, we are able to produce quality images and eliminate some of the environmental concerns associated with traditional X-ray, such as disposal of chemicals, fixer/developers and silver," Rodriguez said. "We will use CR primarily for inspecting titanium tubes for the welds, as well as for some composite materials such as graphite and fiberglass, as well as taking advantage of electronic archiving of images."

Bell Helicopter will install CR in January of 1998, while Alloyweld is currently beginning implementation of the system, having just completed a training course with Fuji.

FNDT products and systems are utilized by non-destructive imaging customers to produce superior images. Headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, FNDT's product line includes industrial film, film processing equipment, print networks and Fuji Computed Radiography (CR), a modality Fuji pioneered more than a decade ago. Fuji Photo, Ltd., a $10 billion technology-oriented company that has ranked in the top 10 of all global corporations for U.S. patents granted in the 1990s, ranks as 159 on BusinessWeek's Global 1000 listing of the top companies worldwide.