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We are saddened to announce that Mark Johnson, a founder and former director of Fairburn Heating Solutions died suddenly on 28^th May.  His funeral will be held on the 28^th June, and the company will be closed on that day as a mark of respect.  Craig Carr, Managing Director commented “The thoughts and best wishes of everyone at Fairburn go to all Mark’s family and friends at this difficult time.  Mark was one of the driving forces that helped establish and grow Fairburn Heating Solutions and those of us who worked with Mark have many good memories of our time together.”

The Fairburn Heating Solutions team has been boosted by three new arrivals in the last 12 months, in addition to on-going development of the existing team members.

Finlay Robinson-McCrae joined Fairburn in April 2023, as a Process Gas Trainee.  Finn works mainly with Sean, supporting our clients in the North West of England.  He has just started his college apprenticeship which involves around 30 weeks of block release studies over the next 2 years.

Harrison Barrowclift is also a Process Gas Trainee, who joined the team in October 2023.  He generally works with Sam, and his hard-working attitude has already earned compliments from clients and other team members.

Amy Cooper is our newest recruit, joining us in December 2023 as Office Administrator working with Niki.

We’re also delighted that Sam Harris qualified as a Process Gas technician in January 2024, and Jay Bovill is now qualified as a Gas Engineer, and is working towards his Commercial Gas Engineer training.

If you would like to be the next new member of the Fairburn team, please see our careers page for the latest vacancies.

Earlier this year, the Fairburn Heating Solutions team completed one of the biggest contracts the company has undertaken, installing the main gas pipework on a new brick Kiln made by Keller at the Ibstock Atlas site near Walsall.  In addition, the job involved the installation of compressed air pipework for the air actuator dampers and the cooling air for the sight glass viewing ports.

The kiln is rated at 20 Megawatts, from a total of 650 gas burners, supplied by an 8-inch gas pipeline.  It is part of a £45M clay brick manufacturing facility which can produce up to 80 million bricks per annum.  Construction of the site began in 2020 and the site has been visited by Andy Street, the West Midlands Mayor and was opened by the Mayor of Walsall.

The new facility will have an industry leading manufacturing cost and sustainability profile.

Reflecting on the project, Craig Carr, Managing Director of Fairburn Heating Solutions said “This was a great project for Fairburn Heating Solutions Ltd; as with most sizable jobs they are never without challenges along the way, however as always, the team have pulled together magnificently to deliver our work to Keller Kilns GmbH & Ibstock Bricks’ satisfaction.

Great work team Fairburn!”

To discuss your process heating installation [link] projects, no matter how big or small, call us today on 01886 358 025, send an email to totalsolutions@fairburnhs.com or use the contact form on our website.

The Fairburn Heating Solutions engineers have been racking up the miles recently, visiting clients in all parts of the British Isles.

Craig, Harrison & Sean travelled to Wastecare in Sandwich Kent, adding a high velocity burner to the end of the medical incinerator to improve performance & reduce downtime caused by product sticking to the incinerator internals This was a project designed by Kempston Controls Thermal Solutions division. The project was handed over by James Brown representing us.

The incinerator now has capacity to run at temperatures over 1200°C.

Craig, Dan, Sam, Jay and Harrison all headed to the Isle of Skye to install 14 gas meters for Mowi which will support their energy efficiency drive and carry out their annual dryer service and also to upgrade flame sensing on dryer 2 to self-checking UVs on three of the burners

Sean, Dan, Fin, Harrison then returned to MOWI to install 5 x Ratiomatic burners supplied by Kempston Controls to dryer 1 to allow the customer to run at much lower temperatures to suit the new product requirements.

Sean was in Ireland at the Eviosys canning plant in Athy, County Kildare to install a new modulating gas valve to an existing canning line that failed.

So wherever you are in the UK or Europe, if you would like to talk about your process gas heating design, installation or maintenance, call us today on 01886 358 025, send an email to totalsolutions@fairburnhs.com or use the contact form on our website.

With effect from 1^st November 2023, the team at Fairburn are relocating to 96B, Blackpole Trading Estate West, Worcester WR3 8TJ.  Our phone number is unchanged as are all other contact details.

Commenting on the move, Managing Director Craig Carr said “Since we opened our office in Martley in 2005, the business has changed considerably and now is a good time for us to move to new premises that meet our current requirements and give us a good base for the future development of Fairburn Heating Solutions.   Our new location, closer to the M5 will improve our response time to the vast majority of our clients and the additional office space is a better working environment for the team and will help them deliver the excellent service that our clients value.”

Cam Fraser finished the season in style with a second place and first place at Brands Hatch last weekend, securing the British GP2 championship by a massive 83 points from his nearest rival.

Cam achieved 7 wins, 12 second places and 2 third places from his 22 races this season, a phenomenally consistent performance across over 7 months of hard racing.

A massive “well done” from all of us at Fairburn Heating Solutions, we’re so proud to sponsor you and your team.

Cam Fraser (pictured above) has made a flying start to 2023, building on his second place finish in the British GP2 Championship in 2022.  Cam picked up a second place in the first race at Silverstone and then won race two.  After the first six rounds he has taken 133 out of a possible 150 points and leads the championship by 8 points.  The next two rounds take place at Knockhill this weekend (16-18 June) and we’re keeping everything crossed for more strong results.

Michael Tustin (above), our other sponsored racer is competing in the EMRA 401- 600 cc class in 2023 and opened the season with a 4^th and 3^rd place, then won both the 3^rd and 4^th races to open up a big lead in the championship table.   He is also leading the Mallory Trophy for bikes up to 600cc with 90 points out of a possible 100 so far.

Craig Carr, Managing Director of Fairburn Heating Solutions said “It’s great to see Cam pushing on again from his strong performance in 2022 and Michael has made a tremendous start too; it’s great to see both our riders at the top of the table and we’re very proud to be associated with them again this season!”

At Fairburn Heating Solutions, our guiding belief is that process heating should never cause downtime.  Our vision, values and everything we do for our clients is built on this simple, but powerful belief.

How do we do it?

We work with our clients to help them transition from “reactive repairs” to a philosophy of “proactive asset management”.  We take them on the Fairburn Asset Management Journey to reduce breakdowns, grow productivity and transform the performance of their industrial gas heating system.

Does it work?

We get lots of very positive feedback from our clients and whilst many like to remain anonymous, some have allowed us to share great testimonial quotes and case studies.

However, that wasn’t enough for Craig Carr, Managing Director of Fairburn Heating Solutions.  As he put it “It’s fantastic when a client tells you how pleased they are, but we wanted to have some more concrete evidence, so four years ago we started tracking the amount of downtime repair work we carried out, to see if it was indeed reducing as we helped our clients move to a more proactive, planned approach to maintenance.”

What are the results?

The early data was very encouraging, but we quickly realised that looking at individual months was potentially misleading due to the inherent unpredictability of breakdowns and some seasonality in the maintenance work we undertake for clients.

To give a clearer picture we decided to track a moving 12-month figure which gives a smoothed figure.  This approach is commonly used to track performance where there is seasonality and volatility in the monthly data.  Unfortunately, it meant we had to wait a bit longer to see the results which tested our patience!  However, we now have over three years data and there is a clear trend with invoiced work from downtime repairs reduced by over 35% compared with 2020 for the same basket of clients.

Doesn’t that mean the business is in decline?

You might think so, but on the contrary, our strategy is not only delivering positive results for our clients, but it has also created the conditions for our business to enjoy sustained growth.

A shift from reactive to proactive maintenance work has allowed us to make better use of our expert engineers and given us the confidence to quote for and win new clients.  As a consequence, our business is growing, diversified and more resilient.

In summary, as Craig says “It really is a win-win:  our clients suffer fewer unplanned breakdowns, save money and strengthening their customer relationships; while our business continues to grow.”

Can my business benefit from the Fairburn approach?

If you would like to find out more about the Fairburn Asset Management Journey and how we can reduce unplanned breakdowns in your operations, please call us on 01886 5358 025, email totalsolutions@fairburnhs.com or send us an enquiry.

Just over a year after our first visit, James, Jay and Dan were back in the Isle of Skye for a week earlier this year, working for Mowi ASA, the largest producer of Atlantic Salmon on their Salmon feed driers.

In addition to our role as annual service provider, we were commissioned to replace two gas burners with smaller ones to provide more temperature control and save energy.  We removed two Winnox WX300 burners and replaced them with two Ratiomatic RM300 burners to give Mowi a lower temperature at the end of the oven, forcing the start and middle zones to increase temperature which gives the oven a better overall temperature profile for the drying of the Salmon feed.

The burners were acquired through Kempston Controls, who are channel partners of Honeywell.

The installation was a great success, and Mowi are now enjoying the energy saving.

We are always happy to support our valued clients when they undertake charity fundraising, but it’s still nice to receive a letter like this from Tim Freeman the Deputy Managing Director of Toyota thanking us for our support.

Like many of our clients, our relationship with Toyota is along one, going back over 15 years and is a good example of building a trusted relationship and a proactive maintenance service that supports their manufacturing goals.  To read the full letter, click on the image above.