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In some types of small batch work, component geometry and non-turning content determines that a standard CNC lathe is more suitable than a mill-turn centre says an antennas manufacturer.

Stratford-upon-Avon based Precision Antennas is experiencing a boom! Since the start of 2002 the company has expanded its workforce by almost half to 192 people and is adding to its factory capacity.

In line with this expansion, the company has recently installed two of the latest Colchester Tornado 220 lathes, bringing the number of Tornado machines in the factory to four.

Precision Antennas is privately owned with over 50 years’ experience in the development and manufacture of antennas and associated support structures.

Its installed manufacturing capabilities support the fabrication of dish-form antennae up to 6.4 metres in diameter, and single piece and hand-spun antennae up to 4.5 metres.

Manufacturing manager, Alan Brooks explains the philosophy that has created such success: “Our ability to design, develop and build virtually all our key components in-house not only guarantees quality and performance but it also means we can respond very quickly to customer’s needs.

Our customer base is largely drawn from the mobile telephone industry, OEM radio systems manufacturers, global communications service providers and the defence sector.” The company’s products are exported worldwide, either directly and indirectly, and due to the nature of the business, almost all manufacturing output is made to contract.

While batches can sometimes reach 250, quantities tend to be nearer 10 or 20 parts.

Machining facilities at the factory now range right up to full five-axis milling capability.

For two-axis turning, the company has focused on chucking versions of the Colchester Tornado which originated with the installation of a Tornado 100, followed by a larger capacity 210 machine.

Precision Antennas was then one of the first companies in the UK to install the latest Tornado 220 following its launch in 2001 and quickly followed with a second machine as production demands grew.

As Brooks maintains: “When you look at the value for money aspect of the Colchester product we don’t know of any other lathe on the market that can match it.” He follows on to outline that although some of the turned parts require subsequent drilling and milling operations, because the batch quantities are so small, breaking the turning from machining of the other features is the most cost-effective method and a Tornado is quicker to set up than a mill/turn lathe.

Brooks describes how the Tornado machines can maintain tolerances without any problems and the operators and setters particularly like the improved ergonomics and working area of the latest 220 compared to the 210.

He describes how having four machines out of the same stable means operators can easily move from machine to machine without thinking, and the company has excellent backward/forward capability with CNC programs giving considerable tooling flexibility.

“When you bear in mind the Tornado 220 was some 20 per cent less expensive than the previous 210 model, it is certainly a lot of lathe for the money.

An additional factor in the decision to stay with the Colchester product is the good after-sales support we have received.” The original Tornado 100 has a bar puller which enables bar lengths to be machined, but by far and away most operations across the four machines are based on castings and sawn billets.

Component diameters span 25mm to 350mm and cycle times vary between 90 seconds and 15 minutes.

“Operations mainly comprise outside turning, face grooving, boring and internal tapers and grooves but we also machine quite a lot of parabolic curves which require interpolation,” he says.

Coupled with program delivery by DNC, most changeovers take around 30 minutes which includes chuck jaws.

But as Alan Brooks describes, the improved ergonomics of the latest 220 machines make life much easier.

Among the improvements in the machines between the 210 and 220 is the Colchester patented base redesign which introduced ‘Duo-stable’ construction incorporating an engineered concrete polymer base fill.

To this foundation Colchester added heavier and larger ways which contribute to improved static and dynamic stiffness, and the whole machine has higher thermal stability.

These basic improvements enabled higher power 22kW motors and drives to be included in the specification with much improved spindle design, faster axis motions and turret indexing.

And, with redesign and positioning of the hydraulic tank at the front of the machine and coolant tank at the opposite end, maintenance and swarf removal is easier and operational benefits through grease lubrication in favour of total loss oil, gives improved coolant consistency and cutting tool and coolant life.

The versatility of the machines is further enhanced by the way in which Precision Antennas operates them.

Some components are programmed with stops in the cycle which allow the operator to turn or relocate the part in the chuck jaws before re-starting the cycle.

In addition as three of the machines are arranged in a ‘U’ formation this enables more flexible operation as a cell.

“The aim is to always get a finished turned component from the machine with one operator visit, and failing that, to progress work through the turning section as quickly as possible,” concludes Brooks.

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The biggest through bore spindle and a high torque capacity option features the latest addition to a range of precision CNC lathes that employ a massive slantbed cast iron base construction.

The biggest through bore spindle for a Hardinge CNC lathe ever will be launched at the forthcoming MACH 2004 exhibition.

With a 250mm chuck as standard and a 78mm through spindle bar capacity, the Talent 10/78 complements the other Talent machines covering the 45 and 52mm bar range with 150 and 200mm chuck sizes respectively.

A massive 30deg slantbed cast iron base construction is used providing good accessibility for loading heavy parts and a clear path for chips to fall into the slat type chip conveyor supplied as standard equipment with the machine.

The 10/78 has a powerful 18.5kW spindle drive as standard with 404Nm torque rating at a base speed of 437 rpm.

For those really heavy cutting jobs on big diameters there is a high torque option with 605Nm of torque at only 292 rpm using the latest Fanuc electronic gearbox technology.

An A2-8in spindle is mounted in a combination taper and angular contact four bearing arrangement to produce optimum angular and radial stiffness producing good roundness part concentricity.

With a maximum turning length of 600mm, a VDI-40 12 station turret and No 5 MT fully programmable tailstock the Talent 10/78 takes Hardinge into the big league when it comes to turning capacity.

The carriage and crosslide are both mounted on heavy duty 6 ball contact linear guideway designs driven by 40mm ballscrews with a maximum traverse rate of 30mpm.

Ideal for OEM customers and sub-contractors alike, the Talent range now covers more than 75% of all the turned parts produced on CNC lathes by size.

From small batches to dedicated volume manufacturing the Talent has found its niche for economical part production of turned parts.

A 5.63kW 4,000 rpm driven tooling option is available for the Talent 10/78 enabling complete machining of many parts using C-Axis milling, cross and end drilling and tapping in the same operation.

The fully programmable No 5 MT hydraulic tailstock has 625mm of travel on the base and 150mm of travel on the quill for easy loading of shaft type parts.

Talent 10/78 has Fanuc model OiTB CNC control along with the latest digital Series spindle and axis drives and motors.

A full range of optional and additional equipment is offered for bar and chucking work, including Renishaw automatic tool probe/tool wear monitoring system, part probes, part catcher/conveyor, barfeeds, turret and spindle tooling.

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General engineering company needs as much flexibility in its machine tools as it can get, which is why it sought a CNC lathe to change over quickly and frequently between bar and chuck work.

South Wales based general engineering company D’Arcy Engineering Co needs as much flexibility in its machine tools as it can get and certainly pushes the capacity right to, and often beyond, the limit.

As a prime example, its Colchester Tornado 220 two-axis CNC slant bed lathe is used for both bar work up to 65mm diameter and chucking applications to which the proprietor Nigel Allsop maintains: “We frequently change the machine over from bar feed to chuck or back again inside 10 minutes and we have even stretched its turning capacity from the specified 260mm to 300mm diameter and that’s on steel components.” D’Arcy which is a very successful machinist company has its premises on one of the largest business parks in Europe at Llansamlet, just north of Swansea.

That said, it still has to work hard to meet its customers demands for quality and delivery in the medical, construction, automotive and general machining sectors which means choosing the right machine for its needs is critical in its success.

Here, the installation of the Colchester Tornado 220 with its integrated MBF 1000 bar feed package bought from Erith, Kent, the new Colchester Sales Technical Centre partner RK International, was seen as important in the plans for future growth.

With a slightly different operation to most subcontract machinists, Allsop has his feet in two camps.

Not only is his general machining operation very successful in supporting locally based international names such as Sony, Bosch and Morganite it has strong links with a prolific local scientific research and development company where it provides a highly successful design for production service.

Set up some 12 years ago D’Arcy employs six people and moved to its current site six years ago when it outgrew its original premises.

At the time of the move, Allsop invested in several CNC machines.

However, to meet the growing production machining requirements for batches that vary between one and 500 parts and especially the fast turnaround the company has to make to customers.

“We then decided to purchase the newly launched Tornado 220,” he says.

Materials now turned on the Tornado 220 include brass, PTFE, engineering plastics and both mild and high tensile steels and while its regular customer base places scheduled orders giving the ‘bread and butter’ to the business, they tend to be at the top end of the quality spectrum in terms of tolerances and finish.

Allsop describes a recent automotive schedule for aluminium mounting components to be used on high end audio systems in the executive/luxury car market sector.

“These parts had to be machined for the first tier automotive systems manufacturer and had to be totally compliant with their strict drawing and quality demands.

The Tornado met all the requirements for the job and the project was completed with great success,” he says.

D’Arcy’s business involvement with the research and development company has placed significant demands on the machine shop on the back of the burgeoning success of a number of products being brought to market.

Here, Allsop’ s experience in machining has led to an important boost to this side of the business especially influencing the design for manufacture element, where he can advise and prove the benefit of cost reduction and simplification.

He is also able to help develop features on a design based on the practicality and advantages gained from a particular machine tool, tooling and control system A prime example, which led to gas nozzels, brass pins and mechanical handling equipment for the medical sector being very efficiently produced on the Tornado came out of the design for production development programme.

One particular project, code named Predator, is a gas scavenging system which is currently under development for high quality manual or automatic MIG or TIG welding.

Predator detects the presence of shield gas allowing welding to continue right up to the point when the gas bottles are empty rather than the normal procedure which requires pre-emptive changing of bottles.” The Tornado 220 is powered by a 22kW AC spindle motor which Nigel Allsops’ machine setters use to the full explaining that when over capacity turning the 300mm steel billet, the power meter never even moved from its normal position.

The machine was specified with the 3,500 revs/min lower speed option spindle with rapid traverse rates for the VDI 40, 12 station turret being 25m/min in X and 30m/min in Z.

While swing over the bed is 510mm, the maximum turned length is 540mm which is described by D’Arcy’s setter as ‘very handy’ for the exceptional larger part they sometimes have to turn.

According to Allsop, features of the Tornado 220 that have proven to be an excellent bonus is the basic stability of the machine which he puts down to the Duo-stable engineered polymer concrete filled base.

“Even when we put oversize work or really push the machine it is inherently stable,” he says.

And following on to conclude he maintains: “The thermal properties of the machine are such that it is able to reach operational stability within 10 minutes of start up.”.

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Flat bed CNC lathe enables parts up to 554mm diameter by 2000mm long to be swung over the bed or up to a massive 830mm by 216mm within the gap bed.

The Colchester MultiTurn 4000 flat bed CNC lathe enables parts up to 554mm diameter by 2000mm long to be swung over the bed or up to a massive 830mm by 216mm within the gap bed.

The machine provides the full advantage of the latest Fanuc control that is equally useable for single part manual cycles or under full CNC control for repeat batches of parts.

Now available from Colchester Lathe of Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire, the 3.6 tonne, larger capacity MultiTurn embodies all the features and advantages of the highly successful 1000 and 2000 versions launched last year.

However, with more powerful spindle and servo drives fitted to the machine, this enables effortless cutting cycles to be performed on larger part sizes.

The MultiTurn CNC lathe is very competitively priced and provides high levels of functionality that takes full advantage of the 11kW spindle drive.

The spindle is carried on a cast iron flat bed with an eight-station 360mm diameter, electrically indexing turret capable of holding 25 mm by 25mm tool section size and 40mm diameter boring bars.

Quick-change toolposts from Parat, Multifix or Dickson are available on request.

The success of the smaller MultiTurn versions has been from the ability to combine the versatility of full CNC, electronic and manual operation through Fanuc’s latest Series OiTB CNC TFT contouring control with Manual Guide Oi conversational programming.

The machine uses twin electronic handwheels to manipulate the Fanuc digital drives package and, with the simple and quick conversational programming, is directed at users requiring additional large CNC capacity or small batch size component turning solutions.

In addition, it will be equally productive as a universal turning machine to the workshop requiring a solution to the wide range of turning operations faced by a general machinist.

Prime considerations are high flexibility to replace or upgrade existing machining capacity with a reliable and modern, high quality, metal cutting machine without compromising the investment budget.

Three-jaw geared scroll or four-jaw independent chucks up to 405mm with a 104mm bore define the capacity of the machine which can also be supplied with travelling or stationary steadies up to 308mm capacity.

The tailstock is No 6 MT with 145mm travel and is available with heavy duty or general purpose centres.

The ergonomically positioned travelling Fanuc OiTB control has an 8.4in TFT flat colour screen with a 10 GByte hard disk and electronic handwheels for manual operation.

These can be used in conjunction with Manual Guide Oi programming with combinations of advanced canned cycles such as stock removal, threading and grooving to create a fully integrated operation.

Automatic cycling direct from memory gives a full CNC capability from within the fully interlocked enclosure with twin slide-aside guard doors.

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