01
Material intake
Plate and sections arrive with EN 10204 3.1 inspection certificates, issued per heat and filed against the order.
Cut, machined, welded and painted under one roof.
Milling, turning, plasma and gas cutting, bending, rolling, welding, assembly, painting and quality assurance happen in our own plant, so there is always someone in the building who can answer for a weld.
The work in our own plant
Seven steps, six of them in our own plant. A partner blasts the steel before we paint it. We can tell you exactly who held the torch.
02
Plasma cutting
Profiles are cut in house to repeatable tolerances, so the joint fits up before anyone strikes an arc.
03
Milling and turning
Bushings, pin bores and coupler interfaces are machined here, which is what keeps the pin centres where the drawing put them.
04
Welding
MAG 135 and TIG 141, to procedures qualified by WPQR, by welders qualified to EN ISO 9606-1.
05
Assembly and fit-up
Subassemblies are dry-fitted and measured before final welding locks the geometry in.
06
Painting
A partner blasts the steel. We paint it in our own plant, under the same control as the weld.
07
Inspection
Visual and penetrant testing by personnel certified to EN ISO 9712, on the joints the drawing calls for, with dimensional checks on the mounting interface.
From plate to pallet
Photographs from our own workshop.
Welded coupler frames with their pins fitted, stacked on a pallet.
Painted couplers strapped to a pallet, with plate stock behind.
A bucket shell with its internal ribs, before painting.
A painted two-tine attachment strapped to its pallet.
Unpainted ripper bodies standing upright on pallets.
Welded grab halves stacked on a pallet.
Fitting a pin into a machined coupler body.
A cylinder and its hoses being fitted inside a weldment.
A coupler assembly on the drilled welding table.
Assembly work at the bench, with the parts bins behind.
Hand-fitting the last parts on the welding table.
A painted assembly with its hydraulics fitted.
A finished coupler on the shop floor.
Identical coupler frames stacked from a production run.
A bucket with bolt-on teeth and side cutters.
Fresh paint on a bucket edge.
The welded mounting lugs on the back of a painted bucket.
Finished buckets on pallets, loaded in the trailer.
A forklift carrying a palletised bucket out of the works.
Moving a toothed bucket on its pallet through the hall.
A coupler strapped to its pallet, ready to ship.
Why the welding is the argument
Hardox is quenched-and-tempered plate, and it punishes a shop that welds it casually. Without controlled preheat and inter-pass temperature the heat-affected zone softens and hydrogen-induced cold cracking follows, often weeks later, in the field, at the joint that carries the load.
The EN ISO 3834-2 certificate covers comprehensive welding quality requirements. The EN 1090-1 certificate covers factory production control for structural steel components in execution classes EXC1 and EXC2.
Qualified processes: MAG 135 · TIG 141
What is certified, and by whom
Certified welding quality
EN ISO 3834-2
EN ISO 3834-2 is the comprehensive level of quality requirements for fusion welding. It covers how welding is planned, carried out, inspected and recorded.
Certificate: CSW/1293/2025 · UDT-CERT
Factory production control
EN 1090-1 EXC1 + EXC2
Factory production control for structural steel components under EN 1090-1, execution classes EXC1 and EXC2, certified by notified body 1433.
Certificate: 1433-CPR-0257 · UDT-CERT: notified body 1433
Qualified welders and procedures
EN ISO 9606-1 · WPQR EN ISO 15614
Welders qualified to EN ISO 9606-1, and welding procedures qualified by WPQR to EN ISO 15614. The qualified processes are MAG 135 and TIG 141.
Non-destructive testing
EN ISO 9712: VT + PT level 2
Visual and penetrant testing by personnel certified to EN ISO 9712 at level 2. Applied to the joints the drawing calls for, not to every weld.
Material traceability
EN 10204 3.1
EN 10204 3.1 inspection certificates, issued per heat of steel and kept with the order.
CE marking
CE: 2006/42/EC
Declaration of Conformity issued with every attachment under the Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC, as interchangeable equipment. Signed by Hydro-Instal as the manufacturer.
Transition to Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 underway. Applicable from 20 January 2027.
SSAB Hardox wear plate
SSAB Hardox: Hardox In My Body
Member of the Hardox In My Body programme: genuine wear plate, verified by SSAB.