Quick-change chucks save time

1st Machine Tool Accessories is advising that a quick-change chuck has the ability to eliminate a majority of the time wasted when changing jaws on a conventional chuck, decreasing the delay between the end of op 1 and the beginning of op 2 by as much as 90%.

Instead of wasting 20 minutes, changeover typically takes just two minutes. The company has produced a cost calculation based on the use of a Kitagawa QJR (Quick Jaw Release) chuck, in support of its claims.
The cost comparison generated by 1st MTA, which shows ROI in a very short time, is based on the use of a Kitagawa QJR chuck. Available in four sizes (7, 8, 10 and 12”), QJR chucks use the same jaws as standard chucks in the range.
1st MTA’s hypothetical illustration is based on the use of a QJR10, a 254 mm quick change, three-jaw, large through-hole power chuck with five sets of standard metric quick-change jaws plus soft jaws, which all costs £6124. This chuck interchanges directly with a Kitagawa BB 210 large bore chuck, priced at £2177 with five sets of jaws, with which the comparison is made.
The average time saved when exchanging the QJR chuck instead of the BB chuck is 15 minutes. Based on three set-ups per day and an estimated machining cost of £60 per hour, the daily cost saving for the three changeovers is £45. The difference in purchase price between the two chucks is £3947. At £45 saving per day, the time required to break even is slightly less than 88 days. On this basis, the total saving by the end of the first year is £12,478, after which the annual saving is £16,425.
For further information www.1mta.com

Nova steps up a gear

Working in the high-speed, high-pressure, environment of motorsport, West Sussex-based Nova Racing Transmissions is constantly working to tight deadlines.

With customers ranging from teams in the World and British Superbike championships, down to club-level racers, producing parts on-time is vital. For this reason, the company has turned to tooling partner Ceratizit UK & Ireland and its WNT brand to deliver improved performance across its machining activities, particularly in the manufacture of gear selector forks.
The most recent development was the introduction of WNT’s ZSG4 centric vices, along with its MNG zero-point location system (pictured), which is used on the bed of the company’s new XYZ 710 VMC HD and on the 4th-axis unit on the machine. As a result, an on-machine flowline has been created that delivers one complete selector fork every cycle from a raw billet. This new process delivers both time savings, with set-up times halved, as well as improved quality and consistency.
“Prior to the adoption of the MNG zero point and ZSG vices we used conventional vices to hold cumbersome fixtures,” says manager Daniel Vaughan. “However, we can now grip on just 3 mm of raw billet, machine one face completely, transfer the part to the 4th axis to machine a location pin, before finish machining the second face [gripped in aluminium jaws that match the shape of the selector fork],” says Daniel Vaughan, manager, Nova Racing Transmissions. “In addition, we are seeing improved surface finish and consistency of parts, with repeatability of between 2-3 µm from fork-to-fork.”
Nova Racing Transmissions’ partnership with Ceratizit is a two-way street, with Nova supplying gearboxes and gear ratios to Sam Burman and her WNT Burman Racing MOTO 3 GP team, which she races in the British Motostar Championship.
For further information www.ceratizit.com

Subcon returns in June

Subcon returns on the 4-6 June 2019 at the NEC, Birmingham. Now in its 43rd year, Subcon remains the UK’s only dedicated event that enables subcontract manufacturing buyers to source suppliers, benchmark capabilities and form new partnerships.

Against a backdrop of profound uncertainty and change within the engineering and manufacturing industries, Subcon 2019 will show how the sector continues to innovate and deliver maximum value, with three events at one venue.
For 2019, the Subcon Launchpad and Launchpad Awards have been unveiled to showcase cutting-edge innovations from across industry. Launchpad aims to boost manufacturing and engineering-based start-ups by giving them an opportunity to share their innovations with thousands of professionals. The exhibition organiser says that the showcase and awards will deliver an unrivalled platform for eight engineering start-ups, along with a £10,000 prize package for the winner.
For further information https://is.gd/wuquba

Finish-machining times cut from 32 to 14 hours

A mould maker serving the automotive industry says WorkNC CAM software gives it a distinct advantage, setting the company apart from its competitors with superior lead-times, quality and expertise. And, as a Beta tester for WorkNC, the company found that a new item of functionality, introduced in the latest release – 2019 R1 – slashed its finish-machining
times by more than half on certain parts.

Operating from three sites in France and one each in Turkey and Slovakia, Julien SA manufactures moulds for interior linings, boot compartment trim and roof linings, along with parts for sound-proofing, foamed components, and aluminium and textile thermal barriers. The company mainly produces single-order parts, or two-to-three small series moulds for foam components.
Based at the 10,000 sq m head office in Le Creusot, France, programming manager Sergio Couto is responsible for preparing production and implementing the product manufacturing process. His department takes the lead on a range of aspects such as technical issues, monitoring and quality control for tooling production.
Although Julien SA makes a small number of moulds for the aerospace industry, most of its customers are major automotive groups that need tight turnaround times. Using WorkNC’s CAD and CAM capabilities, Couto says practically nothing is impossible from a technical point of view.
The software is installed on seven computers on the company’s network, and drives three five-axis machine tools (Breton, Durango and Rambaudi), and four 3+2 machines (Goglio, FPT, Anayak and Soraluce). Explaining how WorkNC is an integral and vital part of its production operation, Couto says the process begins after the programming team receives an assessment from the engineering office with the purchase order: “Firstly, we analyse the CATIA file of the part to be produced, allowing us to isolate items which need to be precise, and to determine what’s feasible.
“With the aid of WorkNC’s CATIA interface we can re-establish the CATIA construction tree, which is crucial, as that data is of paramount importance to our business,” he adds. “WorkNC is one of the rare applications which allows this.”

The company then turns its attention to the number of parts that must be produced, and sets about creating the models in WORKNC, adding offset allowances and any other details required for accurate machining.
“The next step is to prepare the production phase and run tool-path calculations,” says Couto. “We establish machining schedules and adapt WorkNC tool paths to the specific machine being used.”
However, he adds that occasionally the company does not know which machines will be available, meaning generic tool paths must be generated. “This highlights the importance of ‘Machining Contexts’ in WorkNC, because we often have to switch to another machine at the last minute,” says Couto.
The final phase is in the workshop, where WorkNC’s simulation function validates the process before the machines start cutting metal. Here, he says WorkNC’s programming allows the company to undertake lights-out machining: “It means the workshop operates 24/7. From midday on Friday and over the weekend, it is fully autonomous, with automatic tool changing and head rotation. We couldn’t do that without WorkNC.”
As a beta tester for the software, Julien SA trialled a new finishing strategy which allows users to break free from previous constraints caused by tool shapes, and it has slashed machining times by more than half. As a result of the trials, WorkNC 2019 R1 adds the Z-level pattern to the ‘Advanced Toolform’ technology, allowing for tool shapes like barrel, oval and parabolic to be calculated over the part surfaces, including negative allowances.
Couto says the results of using the Advanced Toolform strategy with circular-segment cutters, compared with traditional methods, are indisputable, having reduced the company’s finish-machining times from 32 hours to 14.
WorkNC, part of the Production Software business of Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence, is fully integrated into every machining phase – analysis, comparison, simulation, machining and verification.

Summing up the benefits of using WorkNC, Couto says tool-path calculation times are no longer an issue: “We manufacture some large parts – 2 x 1.5 m – and it’s very rare that calculation times are longer than eight hours for all roughing, finishing, rest material, corner re-machining, and mechanical operations such as drilling and pocket machining. And it’s a user-friendly application that’s so easy to learn, even for employees who’ve never done any programming before.”
The company has also invested in a mobile measuring arm from Hexagon, to make precise measurements at different stages of the manufacturing operation. Julien SA uses the measuring arm to make immediate decisions to either modify or continue the process when a doubt arises, which Couto says guarantees security, saving time. “This all helps with the precision we need to actually manufacture the part, ensuring it’s of high quality, and that it can be cleanly and accurately trimmed, which is particularly important for its final appearance as many of the parts coming out of our moulds are visible to the end user in the vehicles.”
Concluding, he explains why the company first invested in WorkNC in 1994, and how it has developed since then: “In the 90s, mould makers started receiving files from India and China in which radii and planar surfaces didn’t conform to the original part, and it was no longer possible to program with CATIA. Even back then, WorkNC could rapidly generate a tool path, irrespective of a part’s complexity or imperfect surfaces.
“WorkNC has developed in line with the requirements of milling operators, who had previously programmed tool paths directly at the machine tool. We have total confidence in working with it on a daily basis, and it helps us to take issues such as holidays, sickness absences and machine downtime in our stride. It means we can set ourselves apart as a mould maker, ahead of our competitors.”
For further information www.worknc.com

MTA members are moving manufacturing forward

On 28 February the Manufacturing Technologies Association (MTA) staged its annual dinner at the Park Plaza Hotel in Westminster.

The event was attended by over 500 guests from across the MTA’s membership, the wider manufacturing community and beyond. MTA president and director of Yamazaki Mazak Marcus Burton said in his keynote speech: “With the opportunities of the 4th industrial revolution we can leapfrog the past and invest in the future. Digitalisation is going to dominate the future of our industry – in fact manufacturing is already being recast as a digital industry. We in this room have everything that is needed to move productivity forward.”
For further information www.mta.org.uk