Blum To Highlight Benefit of Established Technologies at MACH

3 February 2014

Blum Novotest will be giving a multitude of new products a show debut at MACH alongside a wealth of established innovations. On Stand 5945, at the UK's showpiece manufacturing event taking place from 7th to the 11th of April, Blum will be showing a range of tool setting probes as well as workpiece inspection probes for improving productivity, tool life and component accuracy.

Commenting upon the products that have become established in the UK marketplace since MACH 2012, Blum Novotest UK's Managing Director, Mr David Mold comments: "We launched a series of new products at MACH 2012 that were truly groundbreaking. The level of innovation and benefits of these products is so far ahead of the competition that over the last two years, we have removed a number of competitor products from machine tools to install our innovations. AT MACH 2014; two years after the initial launch of these products, we can demonstrate and qualify the benefits of these products that incorporate technology that is still streets ahead of the competition. As a market leading innovator, Blum will once again be launching new products alongside these established technologies to offer our customers further productivity, accuracy and cycle time savings."

For the elimination of broken cutting tools and the resultant damage or scrapping of components, Blum will be demonstrating the TMAC tool monitoring solution. The ingenious Tool Monitor Adaptive Control (TMAC) system protects the CNC machine while providing valuable information regarding the cutting process. The TMAC is an addition to the Blum product portfolio that has been developed by Caron Engineering, a technical partner of Blum Novotest. Since its introduction, the system that reduces the high cost of replacement tools, lost production and rejected parts by effectively measuring tool wear in real time, has proven itself in industry. It operates on the principle that the horsepower required to cut a part increases as the condition of the cutting edges of the tool deteriorates.

TMAC comprises of a main controller, horsepower transducer, vibration sensor and the TMS display software, all of which can be simply integrated into any CNC machine tool and Windows based PC. The software conveniently enables the machine to be monitored from the shop floor or remotely from the office. To demonstrate how the TMAC can work in conjunction with the Blum LaserControl, Blum will have its market leading tool setting system on show at MACH 2014. Capable of working on multi-functional Mill/Turn machine tools, the LaserControl NT-H 3D from the German metrology manufacturer will highlight its tool setting advantages at the event.

The LaserControl NT-H 3D provides non-contact measurement of rotating tools as well as the mechanical measurement of non-rotating tools in five approach directions. With the increasing use of mill/turn and multi-axis centres; Blum NovoTest has developed the LaserControl NT-H 3D to cater for the demands of these machine types. Traditionally, turning tools are measured with a mechanical probe and milling tools with a laser, the NT-H 3D eliminates the need for both these types, significantly improving setting times. The LaserControl NT-H 3D can set the radius & tool length for both turning and milling tools to reduce set-ups and machine downtime.

Highlighting its renowned Z-Series of probes, Blum will also be showing the established Z-Nano probing system. The accomplished Z-Nano is an extremely compact tool measuring system that can be used on CNC machining centres to conduct automatic tool length measurement and breakage detection.

The new Z-Nano can also undertake temperature compensation in one machine axis. Furthermore, with a ball guideway to reduce measuring forces the system can now measure smaller tools starting from 0.1mm diameter, depending on tool geometry and material. In its standard version, the probe offers an impressively high repeatability of 0.5 µm 2σ.

"We are excited about attending MACH for a number of reasons. Primarily MACH will give us the opportunity to demonstrate the level of technology and innovation in our new ranges and secondly, we can quantify and highlight the benefits of the products that have gained a share of the marketplace since their 2012 launches," concludes Mr Mold.