Mazatrol Fusion 640 is the name for a new machine control recently introduced by Mazak Corp. (Florence, Kentucky). The control is available on the company’s full line of machine tools, including horizontal and vertical machining centers, turning TNGG Insertcenters and multi-tasking machines.
According to the company, this is not a PC-based CNC, although it utilizes PC technology. Rather than simply mounting a PC front-end to a CNC, Mazak has fused the two (hence the name). This fusion allows bi-directional communication between the two computers.
The CNC side of this dual-processor design uses a 64-bit central processing unit (CPU) to execute programmed functions for metal cutting operations. In addition, it is designed to extract information from the machine tool, such as servo-motor loads, and to use that data to suggest improved machining parameters. These suggestions are accessible to the operator using the 32-bit PC CPU.
With this two-way information flow, the control automatically optimizes the process. Instead of making trial cuts to tweak a program, a shop can get the information necessary to maximize cutting speeds and feeds before the first chip is cut.
A control feature called Navigator segments the cutting cycle into time periods. Starting with the longest time period, the operator or off-line programmer can "ask"tungsten carbide inserts the CNC for suggestions on how to reduce that part of the cycle. Drawing from its database, the control makes a recommendation. What-if scenarios can be carried on for every other segment in the program to find the best approach. The CNC looks at programmed feeds and speeds and determines what percentage of the machine tool’s maximum capacity, then calculates how much capacity is left and makes its recommendation based on that difference.
The control will be offered in three distinct versions, one each for the company’s turning centers, machining centers and multi-tasking machines.
One of the most reliable ways machine tool builders maintain workpiece stability is to build a sturdy, heavy frame and a solid bed to reduce the miniscule movements during machining that can cause tool deflection or chatter. However, five-axis machines have a somewhat less-stable worktable design. This is because of the rotation they must provide to position part at different angles.
According to Makino, different five-axis configurations have different benefits and challenges to consider, being that tilting the worktable along the A or B axes can compromise rigidity. For example, at certain positions, a swinging trunnion table can introduce leverage that amplifies micro-movements in the workpiece when the cutting tool makes contact, possibly resulting in deflection and chatter. While this loss of rigidity can be frustrating, the benefits of the complex contouring Carbide Milling Insert and single-setup machining are often more than enough to justify the investment. However, Makino recently developed the D200Z, which it says is designed to eliminate the need for a compromise. The company displayed the machine at Amerimold 2018, where it demonstrated how the CNC vertical machining center (VMC) achieves five-axis movement through a set of two integral rotating tables, one of which is tilted at a 44.5-degree angle.
According to the company, the permanent 44.5-degree tilt is a critical aspect of this rotary-table design. The tilted plate rotates about the B axis, while the rotary table attached to it rotates along the C axis, together enabling full five-axis machining and 3+2 machining. While a trunnion design involves making wide swings that drastically alter the center of gravity of the table, the D200Z Coated Inserts can rotate fully around both axes within a comparatively small area. This improves stability by maintaining a center of gravity entirely within the physical diameter of the table’s bearings. The primary limitations are the size and mass of the workpiece. If it is larger than 165 pounds (75 kg), the benefits of the tilted rotary table begin to decrease compared to larger trunnions or articulated spindles.
Machine rigidity is particularly important in moldmaking applications. High-speed machining to precise tolerances requires anticipating chatter or deflection to avoid scrapping an expensive mold core or cavity. “The table design ensures that the center of gravity is always within the capture range of the bearings,” says Bill Howard, Makino product line manager. “Therefore, regardless of the desired angle or rotary position, the design provides and maintains stiffness and rigidity, as well as ensures excellent kinematics and motion control.” By balancing the need for maintaining rigidity, the D200Z is designed to reduce chatter and deflection in mold machining, as well as other applications that require high precision or have complex part geometries.
Additionally, the tilted rotary table is said to ensure sufficient clearance for the spindle to access critical part features. With a free-standing rotary surface that only attaches to the rest of the machine from the bottom-center of the table, the spindle is designed to easily access five sides of a part, and the cutting tool can reach deep into pockets for molds. The table’s geometric simplicity also simplifies chip evacuation, as moving to a vertical position enables chips to fall into a conveyor, available as a standard feature.
The compact work area also reduces the machine’s footprint, leaving room for attached tool changers or automation cells. Further, the small work area and tilted table reduce the distance operators have to reach in order to load and unload parts, reducing the physical toll and increasing the ergonomics for the user.
Additionally, the compact workspace increases manufacturing speed. Because the machine tool is capable of achieving full five-axis movement and positioning in a small work area, it requires relatively small movements to reach desired orientations. The small movements translate into fast positioning for the workpiece.
Mr. Howard asserts that anyone used to working with five-axis CNC machines should have no problem programming this one. “I would think that anyone familiar with any CAD/CAM system that generates and evaluates tool paths for five-axis machines would have no difficulty programming the D200Z,” he says.
Face grooves in circular flanges are often turned, but turning is a challenging way to produce the special grooves in oil-industry valve bodies. The American Petroleum Institute (API) requires this groove to fit tightly with its sealing ring by means of a ±15-minute tolerance on its 23-degree walls and finishes of 32 and 63 microinches RMS. Those tolerances can be hard to hold when plunging the turning tool into the material rapidly wears the cutting edge. In addition, the valve bodies themselves are simply awkward to turn.
Cutting tool maker Sandvik Coromant has developed Cemented Carbide Inserts an alternate system for API seal ring groove machining that does not use turning at all, or at least not turning on a lathe. The company’s “SpiroGrooving” system instead uses an adjustable toolholder to make face grooves on a machining center. Two turning and boring inserts are simultaneously rotated and helically interpolated to generate the groove.
The toolholder in this system positions the two V-style inserts at a distance appropriate to the groove diameter. The other important component of the system is a software code generator in which the user inputs the groove diameter and the desired cutting pitch and chip thickness (both dependent on workpiece material) to obtain the NC code particular to this groove.
The tool path is not a simple helix. Instead, as the spindle spins the custom toolholder in time Tungsten Steel Inserts with the helical orbit, each of the two inserts alternates between cutting the inner and outer wall of the groove, and the diameter of the helical path tapers to create the 23-degree walls. Sandvik calls the resultant path an “intelligent spirograph.” Watch slow-motion footage in the video above.
A desire to reduce CNC punch press tool setup time and shorten product deliveries motivated Diamond Perforated Metals, Inc. (Visalia, California) to invest in a new tooling system.
Diamond Perforated Metals is a leading supplier of perforated and expanded metals. These perforated sheets are used in the manufacture of a wide variety of products, including decorative lighting fixtures, architectural components, speaker grills, electronic chassis components, filtration equipment and nacelles for aircraft engines.
Hole designs include round, oval, square, diamond, rectangle, triangle and a variety of shapes such as clover and octagon. In addition, these holes are available in a range of sizes and patterns, from 0.050-inch diameter with 225 holes per square inch (HSI) to 1 ½-inch diamond shaped holes in expanded sheets. Materials include type 304 stainless, 5052 aluminum, standard sheet steel, titanium, bronze, inconel and more.
Diamond inventories sheet sizes up to 60 inches by 240 inches with standard hole shapes and sizes that customers order on a regular basis. These “standards” are punched on seven Allcross perforating presses. Custom hole patterns and sizes are produced on Amada CNC punching machines using a large variety of tools. To improve its turnaround time on these custom orders, Diamond Perforated Metals’ production coordinator, Wade Reiboldt, took a look at the company’s turret punching operations and the tooling it was using.
“We identified tool setup time and tool life as two areas where we needed to improve, believing the two would help us turn around customer orders more quickly and with improved part quality,” says Mr. Reiboldt.
The company operates an Amada Vipros 357 and an Amada Coma 567 turret punching machine. Because of the volume of different custom orders it handles with these machines, hundreds of different tools are kept in inventory. Specifying the correct tooling for a job and setting it up takes 20 to 30 minutes, and as many as eight tool changes are made in an eight-hour shift. The company operates three shifts a day, five days a week, year round. With machines down for tool setups two to four hours per shift, Mr. Reiboldt saw this as an important opportunity to improve so he began talking to tool suppliers to find a better way. That’s when he found John Delgadillo, sales representative for Mate Precision Tooling (Anoka, Minnesota).
“Mr. Delgadillo showed us how Mate’s Ultra tool system could be set up on the machine quickly and by hand without the use of wrenches,” says Mr. Reiboldt. “Ultra really had a nice feel to it because all of the tool components—the punches, dies and strippers—simply snapped together in your hands. The tools we were using required off-line tool assembly using a setup fixture, screwdriver and wrench. Shimming the punch to get the correct punch length was required, and the setup process took up to a half hour for some jobs. By comparison, we set up Mate’s Ultra in just five to ten minutes right at the machine, and our press operators love that.”
Diamond Perforated Metals’ initial investment in Mate Ultra tool canisters with a small quantity of punches and dies got the company started on what turned out to be tool setup efficiencies of 65 percent to 85 percent. With the Mate Ultra system, Diamond Perforated Metals improved its tool setup time immediately, not just by using the new tool components, but the old ones as well. With the Mate Ultra system, which accepts any brand of tool components, Mr. Reiboldt’s press operators were able to use new and old tool components interchangeably.
Diamond Perforated Metals regularly punches hard materials such as titanium and inconel. “These hard materials are tough to punch,” says Mr. Reiboldt. “They build heat in the punch tooling, and components wear out faster. With Ultra’s unique design, harder materials like titanium are punched with less stress and wear to the tool components. That’s because Ultra’s hardened and ground guides reduce abrasive action of punching hard materials, defusing heat effectively, resisting galling, and extending tool and turret life. Also, the tools’ interior and High Feed Milling Insert exterior spiral grease grooves provide even and consistent tool lubrication.”
Another Ultra feature Mr. Reiboldt liked was the Slug Free die design, which keeps slugs from sticking in the die area and preventing damage to tools and finished parts.
Another important feature that the company liked is Ultra’s quick length adjustment. This is achieved by pushing a button and rotating the punch head. The feature provides an extra 3/16-inch on the overall punch length, which gives users double the sharpenings of the punch, adding to its usable life.
An important benefit using Ultra was the increase in throughput speeds allowed by the tooling. Ultra’s operating features, including tool lubrication, are designed to handle the upper speeds of the Amada machines and Diamond Perforated Metals’ large Tungsten Steel Inserts number of holes, which range as high as 1,000,000 in a single 60-inch by 240-inch sheet. “We very often run at 230 strokes per minute on thinner materials and slower on harder materials such as stainless. Material thickness and type, hole shape and size all have an effect on throughput speed,” says Mr. Reiboldt, “but generally we are able to operate at significantly higher speeds using Ultra.”
Diamond Perforated Metals’ use of Mate’s Ultra cluster tools, in addition to single station tools, increases the number of holes per hit by several times. The company has more than 100 different cluster punches, tools and dies in inventory and uses them on jobs requiring large numbers of holes in a single sheet. The cluster tooling design guides the punch point at the tip as it contacts the work material. This support enables the tool to achieve better performance. On parts requiring thousands of holes, for example, Ultra cluster tooling increases output significantly and still retains hole quality. Hole edges are clean without burrs and sheets stay flat.
“Some punched sheets have more holes than material,” says Mr. Reiboldt, “which can cause the material to bend and deform. Mate’s Ultra cluster tools hold the sheet flat when it’s punched and punch it cleanly so there is no material bending.” MMS
BLM Group offers its LT8 tube cutting machine designed for flexible, easy and precise laser cutting. The machine accommodates tube diameters ranging from 12 to 220 mm (0.5" to 8.8") and bar weight ranging to 35 Kg/m (77 lb/39"). The unit is equipped with a rotating head that enables three-dimensional, five-axis cutting and features an automatic loading system to increase productivity. According to the company, complex processing such as cutting different pieces on the same bar or batch-changing among bars is managed automatically.
The company will also provide information on the LT5 entry-level automated laser tube cutting system; 4Runner tube bender for HVAC applications; Elect all-electric tube Carbide Grooving InsertsShoulder Milling Inserts bender; ETurn right-hand, left-hand all-electric tube bending machine; and LT Jumbo laser tube cutting series.
