One of the biggest challenges for any machine shop is workshop air quality and the impact coolant mist has on staff wellbeing. To prevent coolant mist from impacting the air quality in the workplace, Tooling 2000 installed on-machine mist extraction systems from Filtermist.

In addition to COSHH-compliant clean air, the Birmingham-based automotive subcontract manufacturer is also benefitting in other less obvious ways, as senior business development manager at Tooling 2000, Iain Bubb, explains: “Filtermist systems firstly protects our workforce, which is of paramount importance. However, they also allow us to open our machine doors sooner, providing more machining uptime.”

If the doors of the machines are opened immediately after a cutting cycle without Filtermist system in place, oil mist enters the air. This results in a film on the machines, tools, floor and anything else in the vicinity, causing a health and safety concern.

“With Filtermist, we’re removing all airborne particulates from the machine tool atmosphere, which not only keeps the inside of the machine clean, but also also helps to remove the swarf as it does not stick to any tacky coolant residue on the machine bed.”

With the Filtermist FX5002 mist extraction systems fitted to its range of Hurco machining centres, Tooling 2000 finds maintenance of the technology easy to manage.

“We have a TPM [Total Productive Maintenance] system in place so, after a set number of production hours, we change and clean the Filtermist filters. Productivity is also very important to us as it cascades down to the bottom line. With the Filtermist technology we get more uptime from our machines, giving us better productivity and profitability.”

More information www.filtermist.co.uk

Aylesbury-based R&A Engineering won a contract in early 2023 to produce several hundred aluminium parts per month (across six variants) for assembly into sensors that optimise the orientation of wind turbines. The job was tying up a pair of BT 40-taper vertical machining centres on the shop floor and impacting the subcontractor’s ability to take on other work. So the decision was taken to transfer production to a 30-taper, high-speed VMC, prompting an order for a Brother M200X3 with 16,000 rpm spindle from Whitehouse Machine Tools.

The new Brother Speedio M200X3 five-axis VMC has on average halved the time it takes to complete post-anodising milling, drilling and tapping operations on the six components. The machine is therefore able to perform the same work as the two VMCs used previously.

Ed Piotrowski, operations manager at R&A, says: “The Brother performs very well. Cycle times are now between 90 seconds and four minutes, half of what they were before. Moreover, the machine holds the ±0.05 mm tolerance all day long without any problem. It’s a really accurate machine.”

Reviewing the characteristics of the respective BT spindle machines, Piotrowski observes that while power and rigidity are higher in a 40-taper VMC, modern, smaller-taper counterparts such as the Brother have a reasonably well specified spindle motor with good torque, even in the medium- to high-speed range. The drive motors are also consistent with robust machining, while face-and-taper-contact tool retention assists further, as in R&A’s case.

He says: “Although the machining of light alloys is really the province of this type of machine, using CAM software to create intelligent cycles involving light depths of cut and high-speed contouring means it can also tackle tough and difficult-to-machine metals.”

More information www.wmtcnc.com

The benefits gained from automating the machining of prismatic components in a high-mix, low-volume production environment are no better exemplified than at Alitech Precision Parts in Silverstone. Since 2019, the subcontractor has invested in four German-built Hermle five-axis, trunnion-type machining centres from UK agent Kingsbury. Two are equipped for automatic exchange of pallets (with fixtured workpieces) between a storage system and the machining area.

Alitech’s owner and managing director Darren Cudd says: “The essence of making this type of production profitable is to buy a high-quality, powerful, reliable machining platform, equip it with accurate zero-point clamping systems and use high-end carbide tools that we can push to the limit of their performance. You must also have the confidence to program and simulate a new cycle in CAM before leaving it to run overnight without anyone present.”

This is exactly what Cudd has been doing since a Hermle C 22 UP machining centre, equipped with a PW150 storage and handling system for 18 square pallets (320 mm), was installed in 2020, six weeks before the start of the Covid pandemic. Two years later, a Hermle C 42 U arrived on the shop floor. Then in October 2024, a second automated Hermle cell was installed, a 650 x 600 x 500 mm capacity C 32 U machining centre featuring an HS Flex two-level store housing 12 square pallets (400 mm).

Cudd calculates that, disregarding this latest purchase, the other automated C 22 UP cell accounts for less than 30% of the site’s machine tool investment, yet has for the past few years generated up to 50% of Alitech’s turnover, a performance-to-cost benefit approaching 2:1.

More information www.kingsburyuk.com