After 11 years at HERA, we’d like to let our membership and industry know that our General Manager Structural Systems Stephen Hicks will be heading back to the UK to pursue a career as Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Warwick. Stephen came to us from the Steel Construction Institute (SCI). He’d been…
What the heck is HERA about and what’s our plan for the future? Two very good questions – and we’re excited to tell you the answer! Because for the first time, we’re releasing our strategy publicly. We’re doing this because we are really focused on building a tribe within our industry. We want to create…
Our metals industry should be driven to make steel the material of choice for designers. A way we can achieve that, is by simplifying the design process through the use of electronic tools and guides. The current market share for steel in construction is 50% nationally. We’ve had particular success in warehouses and multi-storey office…
It’s amazing what you get to learn about someone when you take the time to sit down and really chat. My latest catch up with our Senior Structural Engineer Jing Cao was no different! Growing up in Shanghai China – I think Jing was destined to be an engineer. Although as a youngster he was an…
The world is full of congested cities and Auckland is one of them. Public transport is a main issue and cycling on dedicated cycle paths is suggested as a solution by many including interest groups, city councils and governments. Moving into the age of electric bikes and scooters you’d think large cycle path acceptance by…
We’re pleased to announce that the Heavy Engineering Research Levy Notice 2018 has now been published and listed on the legislation.govt.nz website. This means a levy increase from 5c to 10c per kilogram of welding consumables is due to come into effect on 1 February 2019. We want to thank everyone who responded to our…
In order to ensure in-service safety of steel structures, design engineers need to select steel grades that will remain ductile under the imposed conditions that include in-service loadings, fabrication induced conditions, seismic actions and service temperatures. To achieve this, we’ve developed a new procedure to select steel grades manufactured to Australian and New Zealand standards…
New Zealand’s R&D and innovation performance – can we do better? The answer is yes! NZ’s expenditure on R&D is benchmarking alarmingly low. This is the key takeaway from MBIE’s recently released 2018 Research, Science and Innovation System Performance Report. But why does this matter? According to the OECD and Treasury, low R&D investment…
Nov282018 We were lucky enough to spend time at Victoria University to unpick some of the common misconceptions industry may have about working with academia. This is very important so that in the future we can collaborate more effectively when it comes to R&D to advance our NZ metals industry. And the benefits of building relationships like…
At the beginning of the month, HERA was honoured to sponsor a presentation on cost effective fire solutions for steel structures in collaboration with the Auckland Structural Group. We’ve found it’s a growing area of interest to many of our members and to the structural engineering fraternity. Particularly as it’s been captured in the new…
It’s that time of year when we’re sending out our feelers for potential R&D project proposals from our membership. For us, it’s crucial that our chosen R&D focuses are industry driven. This is because we 100% want to deliver you value from the outcomes – and we can’t do that if you we don’t know…
HERA is proud to continue our support in fostering student education. Once again stepping up to support this year’s University of Auckland Final Year Projects for Mechanical Engineering. We’re able to do this through our charitable trust HERA Foundation which is focused on the promotion of study and understanding of ferrous and non-ferrous metals in…