Product category:
Machine spindles and spindle attachments
News Release from: CTL Centreline | Subject: Right-angle milling and drilling heads
Edited by the Manufacturingtalk Editorial
Team on 06 November 2002
Right-angled heads drastically reduce
setups
Using right-angled milling and drilling heads in a machining centre enabled key features on a component to be completed in two set-ups instead of, traditionally, six or seven.
When Coventry-based subcontractor, Kencom, won a contract earlier this year from UK foundry, JL French, to machine die cast aluminium oil pans for a major car manufacturer, the company decided to invest in a Mazak Variaxis 630AX 5-axis, twin-pallet machining centre and special tooling, including three right-angle milling and drilling heads from Centreline The combination enables key features on the component to be completed in two set-ups whereas historically, similar parts were machined by Kencom in six or seven separate operations on a conventionally-tooled, 3-axis vertical machining centre
This article was originally published on Manufacturingtalk on 14 Jul 2000 at 8.00am (UK)
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Heavy-duty head mills tough materials
A very heavy-duty, right-angle head weighing 750kg for a nuclear energy equipment manufacturer in the USA transmit 13kW of power at just 50 rev/min to machine tough metals.
Said Kencom's sales director, Mark Jones, "Car components are becoming ever more complex these days, and this one is no exception.
We carried out the original development work on this particular component, so we were well aware that the position of two internal pillars meant that tool access was very restricted." To allow access on the vertical-spindle Mazak machine for drilling nominally horizontal holes and milling a face at 90 degrees to two of them, Centreline designed special 40-taper, right-angle heads with a clearance distance of just 16 mm between the cutting tool and at the end of the head.
Each weighs approximately 8 kg and is exchanged automatically from the tool magazine.
Further reading
Right-angle machining heads stored in ATC magazine
Two right-angle heads - one for milling-intensive work and the other for drilling and tapping - can be exchanged automatically from a machining centre's tool magazine.
Mill/turn investment halves toolholder lead times
Users of high-speed machining may be interested to learn that Coventry Toolholders is halving the lead-time from order to delivery for its flange- and taper-contact HSK toolholders.
Milling head raises flange output four-fold
International manufacturer of wheels has achieved a four-fold increase in production efficiency using a bespoke, three-way, right-angle head to mill 40 flanges/h instead of 10/h.
Speed ratio is 1:1 and maximum rotational speed is 3,500 rpm.
The ER16 collets accept cutting tools of up to 10 mm diameter.
Two components are fixtured on each pallet of the machining centre, allowing Op 1 to be completed on the first component and Op 2 on the second within the same cycle.
The second pallet then swings into the machining area while the just-machined components, now at the load/unload station, are re-fixtured so that at the Op 2 part is replaced by a fresh casting and the Op 1 part is reclamped for Op 2.
This is the first time that angle heads have been used for production applications in Kencom's factory, yet they have proved very reliable despite the arduous, 24-hour operation.
Works Director, Robert Williams, describes the machining sequences, as follows.
Op 1 involves machining all of the external features of the casting and two location holes.
After re-fixturing for Op 2, the internal bosses are faced and seven holes are drilled and tapped (M6).
The trunnion-mounted rotary table is indexed to allow machining of various associated features.
A further 15 degree index plus a one degree tilt brings the component into a position where the first Centreline right-angle head, holding a special 3-flute carbide drill, is able to machine the oil drain hole.
The part is indexed to 15 degrees in the other direction for milling the internal seal face and machining a counterbored hole.
Both operations are completed by the second Centreline head equipped with an over-centre, carbide slot drill.
Holding the oil pan in the same orientation, the third Centreline right-angle head drills and taps two holes in the pickup face.
This is achieved in one operation using an Emuge 'Thriller' carbide tool that drills the hole on the way in, chamfers it when the tool has reached its maximum depth, and interpolates an M6 x 1mm pitch thread on the way out.
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