Family-owned BOGE Kompressoren, with its headquarters in Bielefeld, Germany, is a world-renowned technology specialist in solutions for generating compressed air. Apart from the performance, quality and cost-effectiveness of the products, one of the company’s most important declared goals is the increase in efficiency and safety during manufacturing. When producing screw compressors, Mapal says that its high-performance cutting tools achieve convincing results.

“At BOGE, we are the centre of competence in supplying readily assembled and inspected compressor stages for screw compressors,” explains Mario Birkner, production manager for organisation and projects at the BOGE plant in Großenhain.
At Großenhain, around 40 employees produce very accurately machined cast-iron rotors and housings for screw compressors in highly automated machining centres. Often, it is necessary to meet strict IT6 or IT7 precision requirements, which is where fine-boring tools from Mapal come into play. Not only is maximum precision important here – machining times must also be as short as possible. Well-designed, multi-stage tools often result in low material removal rates that are sufficient to carry out several machining steps. Moreover, the custom tools achieve considerably closer tolerances and better surface qualities while maintaining the same high process reliability. The adoption of new NeoMill face milling cutters from Mapal has paid particular dividends.

“With these new tools, we were able to achieve really impressive success,” says Birkner.

The material removal rate, up from 2 to 4 mm, already made it possible to reduce the machining time by half. Furthermore, the company could double the feed due to the softer cut and thus lower the power consumption of the machine, so that machining time decreased by more than 60%. The tool life per cutting edge of the indexable inserts resulted in further time and cost advantages: 60 minutes instead of the previous 45.

For further information
www.mapal.com

CeramTec‘s new iCT tool system features a completely revised clamping system for optimised performance. At the same time, the number of variants has been reduced to enable easier handling and greater security for customers when assigning spare parts to the tools.

CeramTec’s new iCT (innovative clamping technology) tool system is an update that replaces the S3 series of turning tools and significantly increases process reliability when machining with ceramic cutting materials. The tool system is primarily for use in the automotive and supplier industry for turning mass-produced cast-iron components with high-performance ceramics.
In recent years, cutting speeds have increasingly climbed, placing higher demands on clamping systems.

“In this sector, CeramTec acts as a system supplier, where we supply the turning tool together with the machining technology as an all-in-one solution,” says Johannes Schneider, senior product manager cutting tools, at CeramTec. “Brake discs are one of the core components for which we offer cutting solutions, an area where we have a high level of expertise. With the new iCT system, we provide turning tools with significantly increased performance, as well as a reduced inventory of spare parts, which makes it easier to handle for our customers.”

There is only one clamping screw type (high-strength class 12.9) for all iCT clamping fingers, as well as only one screw size for all different shims. Clamps are also available in different material versions up to a fully hardened metal variant, and can thus be adapted depending on the use case.

The different sizes come in different colours, so that assigning them to the right tool is easy. CeramTec’s iCT clamping system is available for all common insert types and their different applications.

For further information
www.ceramtec-group.com

Customers of Seco Tools can now reduce the time they need for process optimisation with quick, expert tooling recommendations through the recently redesigned Suggest, a free online resource available 24/7.

As machining jobs become more complex, tolerances tighter, delivery times shorter and skilled operators harder to find, shops need reliable access to advice that helps them find the most efficient tooling solutions. After a user enters key information about their machines and application requirements, Suggest sends authoritative recommendations and cutting data in less than a minute.

Suggest provides real-time access to Seco product information and recommended cutting data for most of the company’s products, enabling shops to minimise cycle times.

“Any reduction in machining time helps machining companies to maintain competitive advantages, but traditional cutting-tool selection can be difficult and time-consuming, especially for less-experienced operators,” says Gerrit Kremer, global product manager – digital product services, at Seco Tools.

As more than one tooling solution can address each machining application, Suggest also lists alternative products that may be a better fit for a user’s unique prerequisites. For machine shops that need to optimise thread programming, Suggest accompanies application details with fully optimised CNC code.

Newly optimised for even easier use, Suggest helps machine shops get cutting data and tooling recommendations quickly and accurately. With this comprehensive solution to questions about cutting strategies, customers can leverage the expertise of Seco Tools to achieve their best production results.

For further information
www.secotools.com

The recently released Widia M8065HD indexable milling platform performs heavy-duty milling operations in steel and cast iron materials. Designed with eight cutting edges and extra wide chip gashes, the M8065HD is capable of achieving large depths of cuts while producing high metal removal rates during face-milling applications.

“Face milling is one of the most common machining operations, so we designed a versatile and cost-effective solution that delivers substantial improvements in metal removal rates in steel and cast iron,” says Christine Schneider, Widia senior global portfolio manager.

Engineered to feature a 65° approach angle with a 6.35 mm thick insert, the M8065HD has one universal insert geometry in three versatile grades: WP35CM, WK15CM and WU20PM. All inserts have a 2.37 mm wiper facet to provide reliability and surface finish. These key design features coupled with eight cutting edge inserts enable customers to reduce overall machine set-up times and inventory costs by utilising one tool for multiple operations.

M8065HD indexable milling cutters are available in nine metric diameter ranges between 50 mm and 315 mm, and one insert geometry. Orders for the M8065HD bodies and inserts, as well as other Widia metal-cutting tooling, can be placed through Widia-authorised distribution partners.

For further information
www.widia.com

Dental Direkt, a full-service provider of dental laboratory equipment, has added a shrinking and presetting solution from Haimer for manufacturing its dental prosthetic parts. Set-up for the company’s Swiss-type automatic lathes is now many times faster, leaving the machines free for more valuable machining time.

Machines on site include precision turning and milling machines, as well as eight Tornos Swiss-type automatic lathes from the Swiss GT 13 and GT 26 product series with bar feeders. The Tornos machines primarily produce high-precision laboratory and implant screws, titanium base bonds and individual abutments.

What was not so important with smaller quantities initially became significant due to growing demand for turned parts and their number of variants. The set-up times for Swiss-type automatic lathes were too long for economical production.

“We now handle 37 different implant connections, which reduces our batch sizes to only around 600-1000 parts, “states Jakob Röttger, head of technical sales. “On average, this means that we have to re-tool the machines every second day.”

Dental Direkt determined that the best way forward would be the purchase of a tool presetter, which allows the tools to be set outside of the machine tool and in turn, ensure it remains running. The firm put out a call for tender to various manufacturers but ultimately decided in favour of a solution from Haimer.

The suggestion by Haimer was to invest in its Microset UNO 20/40 tool presetting and Power Clamp Nano NG i4.0 shrink-fit solution.

This combination ensures the highest accuracy, as well as a rapid and reliable presetting process, saving approximately eight minutes per cutter when retooling on the machine.

Röttger says: “The Haimer system has made it possible for us to reduce our set-up times by 50%.”

For further information
www.haimer.biz