Factory investment

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Rolls-Royce plans to invest more than £300m in four new factories and two advanced research programmes in the UK, with £45m of support from the government.

Rolls-Royce plans to invest more than £300m in four new factories and two advanced research programmes in the

£45m of support from the government as part of the Building Britain's Future programme.

One factory will be a casting facility for single-crystal (SX) turbine blades for the company’s most modern, high-thrust engines. Here, Rolls-Royce engineers will develop manufacturing processes before taking them into production.

Another will be used to make discs, the rotating parts used in fans, compressors and turbines. Here, the company intends to roll out a suite of manufacturing processes developed in its advanced manufacturing research centres, which will then also be introduced into production.

An extension of the Rolls-Royce facility in Barnoldswick will produce military wide chord fan blades (WCFBs), which are central to the performance of both military and commercial aero engines. The company is already providing hollow blisked fans for the LiftSystem on the vertical/short take-off and landing (VSTOL) version of the Lightning Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) and for the F136 engine.

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