WORKHOLDING
“With the increase in complex machining, such as fi ve- axis, the workholding has had to evolve to be able to hold a workpiece from underneath, gripping on a small amount of stock so that there is less material wasted,” he said. One adjustment is for workholding equipment to with-
stand greater force from manufacturing equipment. “Because the spindle RPMs are running faster, there is a need for tooling to be able to hold up to the greater forces that are being applied to the material as it is being ma- chined,” he said.
Kurt hardens and grinds “the surfaces that come in contact with the part to resist wear and/or deformation from the hard parts being clamped,” Tschida said. “We choose materials like ductile iron to help absorb cutter vibration. This not only helps reduce chatter but helps increase cutter life.” Newer designs, he said, have helped “reduce part lift and
increase clamping pressure.” The company’s AngLock Dovetail line of vises is designed for general workholding while its VersatileLock vises are intended for increased precision and versatility. Kurt also has designed vises for fi ve-axis and other advanced manufacturing machines. Kurt’s DT20 Dovetail vise is intended to
provide maximum spindle clearance and has a “pre-hard steel design,” rather than aluminum, “for maximum rigidity,” Tschida said. Kurt’s SCMX250 and SCMX425 vises are also designed for improved spindle clearance.
Emuge Corp. workholding equipment for disk brakes.
At the same time, things aren’t that simple. “However, since there is a move to high-speed machin- ing this often means a reduction in depths of cut with an increase in the number of cuts made,” he said. “This allows for some of the unique fi xture and workholding designs that are used today in the fi ve-axis world which allow for a large workpiece to be held on a small area.”
New Designs
Kurt Manufacturing (Minneapolis) has adapted its line of vises to changes in the industry. Hard-to-machine materials “require higher clamping
forces due to the tool pressure generated,” Steve Tschida, engineering manager of Kurt Manufacturing, said in an e- mail. “Due to the material hardness and tool pressure, cutter vibration [chatter] is common in exotic materials.”
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AdvancedManufacturing.org | February 2016
Sophistication Increases BIG Kaiser Precision Tooling Inc. (Hoff- man Estates, IL) has increased the sophisti- cation of its workholding line. “When BIG Kaiser’s Zero-Point clamp- ing system was introduced over 20 years ago, we offered eight choices for receivers with varying footprints to address work- piece size and required rigidity,” Gerard Vacio, sales & engineering support for BIG
Kaiser, said in an e-mail. “Today, we have over 45 receivers and 60 retentions and position elements,” he said. “Advancements in workholding can benefi t from minor changes to noncritical part geometry. The simple addition of a short counter bore to the top of a threaded hold can turn that feature into a positioning and clamping location.”
Coordinating With Customers Emuge Corp. (West Boylston, MA) tries to coordinate with its customers.
“When we think of advanced manufacturing, we gener- ally think of high-end machine tools and associated tooling performing multiaxis operations at high speeds on expensive workpieces,” David Jones, precision workholding manager for Emuge, said in an e-mail.
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