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Spinworx®- and yet it moves!
06.11.2009
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Misjugdements of history:
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+++"Horses will survive for ever, however motor vehicles are only a temporarily fashion."+++
(The president of the Michigan Savings Bank, 1903)
+++"The worldwide demand for motor vehicles is not going to exceed one million pieces."+++
(Gottlieb Daimler, inventor, 1901)
+++"I believe, there is a need on the global market for only 5 computers."+++
(Thomas J. Watson Senior, Head of IBM, 1943)
+++"This wall will persist for the next 50 as well as 100 years, ..."+++
(Erich Honecker, Chairman of the Council of State of the GDR, January 1989)
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+++"Inserts have to be rigidly coupled with the cutter body!"+++
General statement in milling technology, or did you have other alternatives?
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And yet it moves!
(Galileo Galilei)
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Spinworx® - We've got the knack!
Multiple times longer tool life with this new tooling system Spinworx® from Pokolm
The history of round inserts has not impressed through spectacular developments during the past 20 years.
Up to now! Because the new tooling system of the milling specialist POKOLM from Harsewinkel/Germany is the
benchmarking for this innovative tooling-category. And this in a really revolutionary way: Spinworx®
inserts are revolving and manual re-locating of inserts is unnecessary.
This new technology says good-bye to the previous rigid and fixed system of insert holding.
"The traditional technique requires, depending which material- and machine parameters were used, machine
stoppings of 20 to 45 minutes", the company's founder Franz-Josef Pokolm explains. "After this machining
time, the wear limits of the cutting edges were reached and inserts had to be changed or re-located
manually." Due to the lack of alternatives, relatively little life time, and, connected to this fact, long
downtimes had to be accepted.
Spinworx® revolves automatically
Spinworx® stands for the end of manual re-locating of inserts:
It revolves automatically during the milling process. Because it is not rigidly coupled to the insert seat
by screwed connection any more, but is fastened on a threaded stud-bolt-support, which is screwed into the
cutter body. The clearance-fits of the bolt and the insert's bore size are designed to allow fixing
without any further clamping elements, even without checking the pre-stressing of the fastening screw.
Up to four times longer tool life is possible
A confirmation, that these inserts revolve in reality, was generated by pictures, made with a
high-speed-camera from the Laboratory of Machine Tools and Production Engineering of the RWTH University
of Aachen. Pokolm has a close co-operation with this laboratory for a long time, testing several projects.
"The rotation, visible through usage of this camera, is extremely constant, depending on selected milling
parameters, such as tool revolutions, feed rates and cutting depths", Franz-Josef Pokolm explains this
result. "Thereby, we achieve an uniform wear land on our inserts in contrast to the problems with those
punctual loads from the past." Consequently, the process of carbide wear is considerably slower, because
this happens now, well balanced, on the total periphery of the inserts. At the same time, the potential of
every insert is used by 100%, whilst manual re-locating of inserts never has lead to usage of the total
periphery.
"Adding this up, you can reach up to 4 times longer tool life under optimum conditions, compared with
conventionally fixed inserts", product manager Sven Rahmloh highlights the extra-ordinary results of this
innovation. At the same time, the total time/chip volume is increasing, because the milling process never
gets interrupted and all the downtime previously occurred for a complete shift has been eliminated.
Customer tests confirm efficiency
Our tests with this new Spinworx®-milling system at our customers were accompanied by a lot
of scepticism. Karl-Heinz Greßmeier of the company Hermesmeyer & Greweling from the town of Marienfeld
remembers: "It was almost the end of every insert, being unscrewed for re-locating with the previous rigidly coupled
insert, fixed by screw into the cutter body. According to this fact, we were very reserved at first
against the announcement of Pokolm for the new system with a revolving insert". However, the tests at
Hermesmeyer & Greweling started without any problems, and, after 40 minutes, when the usual deadline for
re-locating of inserts had passed without any changes in milling procedure and -performance, all
reservations against this system disappeared. Karl-Heinz Greßmeier says: "After 3 additional hours of
running time, the new Spinworx®-system had convinced us about its capability and
efficiency" The testing company has appreciated very much, that the insert-and cutter-body-dimensions are
interchangeable with the previous system. This helps saving costs for program modifications.
Besides those already mentioned advantages of extremely reduced insert wear and extended tool life, this
system has further positive effects: According to the cutting conditions, a reduced chip compression leads
to a reduction in power consumption. This again affects increased protection of the machine spindle. In addition it leads to quiet running and reduction of noise emissions. And: indexing of inserts is not
necessary any more with Spinworx®.
Like for our range of conventional inserts, the extent of cutter diameters for the
Spinworx®-system starts at 25 mm and ends up with 200 mm diameter. According to the
selection of carbide grades and coatings, it is suitable for machining steel and cast iron. Further
inserts are in preparation.
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