30000th Delcam customer orders FeatureCAM

Delcam has announced that Werkzeugbau Laichingen has become its 30000th customer, with an order for six seats of the FeatureCAM feature-based CAM system.

Werkzeugbau Laichingen undertakes the design, engineering and production of any kind of cutting and forming dies, but specialises in press tools, forming dies and punch tools up to 50 metric tonnes in weight.

As well as offering a complete design, manufacturing and maintenance service, it has equipment to produce samples and undertake inspection reports on the parts.

To further improve its speed of response, Werkzeugbau Laichingen has invested in the latest five-axis machines.

To gain the maximum productivity from this new equipment, Armin Schmid, head of CAD/CAM at Werkzeugbau Laichingen, needed a more powerful 3D CAM system.

It had to allow programming directly based on the 3D CAD model and also be as flexible as the company's existing 2D programming system.

The decision to select FeatureCAM was made after an extensive presentation of the system by Delcam.

This highlighted the benefits of the software, including: the ability to import very large CAD models, up to 400MB in size, quickly and accurately; the feature recognition successfully interpreting the CAD data to give faster programming; and the direct transfer of tool details, with the associated cutting data, from the existing tooling management system.

Another reason was the ability to generate NC output for Heidenhain TNC controls.

FeatureCAM generates the drilling cycles and other subprograms and utilises specific Heidenhain SL-cycles.

This combination delivers programs that are shorter and laid out more clearly.

In addition, it allows the machine operator to quickly edit the parameters at the CNC control.

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