Open house success for Hurco

Despite all the headwinds in the economy, manufacturing has had a buoyant 2022, if Hurco’s experience selling its machine tools is anything to go by. Order intake in monetary value was close to a record high, beaten only just by the exceptional figures posted in 2018. To provide further evidence, 70 companies pre-registered to attend the company’s open house at its headquarters in High Wycombe last month. A total of 104 people attended over the two days, generating £650,000 of sales.

Managing director David Waghorn says: “The outlook for 2023 is good. The vast majority of our customers are subcontractors and all seem very busy. There are raised levels of activity in the aerospace and oil and gas sectors, both are now booming after being in the doldrums for an extended period, while motorsport is perennially active. Against this backdrop, we needed to employ five new service engineers in 2022 and we continue to recruit more.”
For further information www.hurco.co.uk

Total Construction Supplies reinforces expansion

A manufacturer of prefabricated reinforcement steel has invested £4m in a new 220,000 sq ft facility in Cannock, with 57 new jobs created so far. Total Construction Supplies has seen turnover double after securing major new contracts with HS2 and a host of highway, housing and nuclear infrastructure projects. This growth has driven the need for the new site that has already been fitted with state-of-the-art cutting and bending machinery, welding equipment and overhead gantry cranes. Cannock adds to the company’s six existing production sites in the West Midlands, Ilkeston and France.
For further information www.total-group.co.uk

18th edition of SteelFab set to open

The 18th edition of SteelFab will open its doors at the Expo Centre in Sharjah next week (9-12 January). This international exhibition for metalworking, metal manufacturing and steel fabrication will build on the last event in 2022 when the 12,000 sq m show floor hosted 150 exhibitors from 25 countries. In total, over 6000 visitors from 42 countries were in attendance.

Demand for manufacturing equipment derives from the Gulf region’s steel production sector, with sheet metal fabrication as its largest segment. The sector manufactured 3.3 million tons of steel in 2020 with a value of around US$3.1bn. At SteelFab 2023, special focus areas will include machine tools, tube and pipe machinery, and welding and cutting. The complementary SteelFab Conference will see global leaders, experts and suppliers discuss key challenges and opportunities for the global steel industry.
For further information www.steelfabme.com

Geometry measurements guarantee accuracy

For more than 43 years, IASA Instandhaltungstechnik AG has been a reliable partner in the field of maintenance, mechanical engineering and machining technology. Based in Switzerland, the core expertise of IASA AG lies in the production of precision components and the servicing and overhauling of pumps, fittings and safety valves.

Since 2011, IASA AG has been using a Unisign CNC – a compact, high-performance machining centre for the rapid, precise and cost-effective production of aluminium structural components. Its 100 kW spindle drive with a speed of 25,000 rpm removes aluminium at a rate of more than 10,000 cm3/min.

Thanks to the rigidity specified in its design, the machine remains extremely stable throughout. However, after so many years of operation there is an understandable need to verify machine precision, which is why the production manager at IASA AG, Yannic Zünti, recently contacted Unisign and asked for a geometry measurement.

When checking the TRAORI point (the pivot point of the turntable and swivel table), Unisign identified a small dimensional inaccuracy in the Z axis. The company corrected this discrepancy before carrying out further measurements on the spindle in two temperature scenarios – hot and cold. The result: both measurements were once again comfortably within the machine’s specifications.

The Unisign machine at IASA AG is now back in operation, in a way that is cost-effective and prevents wear; it is once again ready to continue production at an extremely high degree of accuracy for many years to come.

Says Zünti: “Unisign enables us to achieve an ideal balance between high reliability, speed, performance and accuracy. Those values are not only of importance to us, but are also crucially important to our customers.”
For further information www.unisign.com

Ballscrew for ultra-accurate machine tools

NSK has developed a new type of ball screw that exhibits reduced motion errors to deliver higher surface finish quality for machine tools used in mould and die machining and other surface-critical applications. By eliminating or reducing the time needed for secondary burnishing or polishing applications, the new ball screw also contributes to higher productivity, while simultaneously reducing the amount of drive torque to save energy.

In recent years, builders of machine tools such as five-axis milling machines have been demanding increased accuracy to produce higher quality mould and die surfaces, where the ball screws used in these machines must further improve motion accuracy.

When a ball screw reverses direction, sudden fluctuations in friction cause ‘quadrant glitch’ motion errors with two peaks, leaving streak marks on the machined surface and reducing surface quality. Numerous studies conducted on quadrant glitches show that it is possible to correct the first peak through numerical control (software-based servo controller compensation). Although it is more difficult to fully compensate for the second peak due to the combined effects of more factors (compared with the first peak), NSK can now present the machining industry with a solution to this problem.

Using real digital-twin simulation and friction analysis, NSK has developed a new ball screw with an optimised internal design. Key to this outcome was the company’s understanding of the underlying mechanism of friction fluctuations in ball screws.

Among its many features, the new ball screw stabilises drive torque and reduces friction fluctuations when reversing its direction of motion, thereby improving motion accuracy and reducing quadrant glitch motion errors. The result is a near elimination of the second peak. Indeed, up to 20% less friction fluctuations also contributes to reducing the height of the first peak.
For further information www.nskeurope.com