Hayes Global Machines (www.hgmwusa.com), a Kansas-based importer of milling, turning, boring and drilling machine tools, is leveraging its extensive relationships with Asian machine tool builders to provide North American manufacturers and job shops affordable productivity tools.
General Manager Hans Strey said that Asian manufacturers of machine tools and other metalworking products have been riding the surge of China’s growth.
However, many of them are planning ahead to secure export business as they know the rapid growth in China will not continue at today’s high levels.
Hayes has secured North American sales contracts with manufacturers of boring mills, vertical turning centers, gantry type milling machines, high-speed milling machines for small parts manufacturing and specially designed milling and turning machines to fit the job shop or small parts automation market.
“It is our belief that the energy, aerospace and mining markets will remain strong through 2012,” Strey said.
“With most builders of large horizontal boring mills and vertical turning centers in Europe and North America quoting delivery times of 12 to 16 months, we have teamed with Chinese builders of this type of equipment who are experienced, have quality products and have an extremely competitive pricing along with shorter delivery times,” he added.
To further demonstrate its commitment to better serve the American machining market, DMG America (www.dmgamerica.com) opened its new Technology Center America in Itasca, Ill.
The facility will employ more than 120 sales, service and support personnel, and will showcase new machines and new services, while having a larger engineering and applications team than the company’s previous facility.
Currently on display at the center is DMG’s recently released Eco line of machines that are geared toward the job shop. This diverse line of high-quality, high-reliability machines is competitively priced, yet come fully featured and backed by DMG’s application engineering, service and support.
The CTX 310 Eco CNC turning machine, for example, delivers complete machining with as many as six driven tools, a 12-station turret, digital drives and linear roller guideways in all axes for high dynamics, full visual displays for 3D simulation, and setup and diagnostics. All at a starting price of $59,900. At its recent grand opening of the center, DMG also exhibited several machines never before seen in the United States.
These included the DMC 55 H duoBlock high-production high-accuracy horizontal machining center; the DMU 40 monoBlock featuring a compact footprint and versatile 5-axis simultaneous milling for smaller workpieces; and the CTX beta 800 universal lathe for larger workpieces measuring to 16.1 in.
The Michigan Aerospace Manufacturers Association (MAMA) has named Global Aerospace Management Solutions (GAMS) of Kalamazoo, Mich., to its preferred vendor network. GAMS provides consulting and training services to companies seeking registration to international quality management standards such as AS9100 and ISO 9001:2000. Through a grant from the state of Michigan, MAMA (www.michman.org) assists it members in achieving AS9100 registration by subsidizing the cost of the necessary training.
“The GAMS appointment to our preferred vendor network is the result of it demonstrating exemplary dedication and service to the needs of our organization and its members,” Craig Wolff, MAMA vice president, said.
Jim Bartz, president of GAMS, responded that his company appreciated the recognition. He added that his company realizes that for MAMA to achieve its mission of representing the interests of Michigan manufacturers to the global aerospace industry, its members need to achieve or update their registration to the very stringent aerospace quality standards.
Okuma America Corp. (www.okuma.com) has entered into a manufacturing and technology partnership agreement with Don Prudhomme “The Snake” Racing for its NHRA top fuel drag racing team.
The two-year associate sponsorship deal through the 2009 season will give Okuma further exposure as the “Official Machine Tool Supplier” for Snake racing and provide Don Prudhomme Racing the CNC machine technology it needs to be even more competitive.
Responding to the growing trend of titanium aircraft components and the need to optimize the process for machining them, the Productivity Solutions business of MAG Maintenance Technologies (www.maint-tech.com) has teamed up with sister company MAG Cincinnati to supply comprehensive, singlesource solutions. These can include capital equipment, specialized cutting tools and applications engineering programming expertise, such as for Catia V5 programming services.
MAG Maintenance Technologies specializes in providing proprietary tooling for optimizing titanium and other material cutting in combination with part programming expertise.
Metal-removal rate and tool life improvements can range from 5 times to 30 times over traditional methods, while applications programming further improves overall manufacturing efficiency.
According to MAG Maintenance Technologies, meeting the demand for titanium parts production has been both a challenge and an opportunity. Key suppliers to aircraft programs such as the Boeing 787, Airbus A380 and the latest generation military aircraft, including the Joint Strike Fighter and Eurofighter, have required huge gains in cubic-inchper- minute metal-removal rates from tooling to supplement their ramped-up acquisition of machine spindles capable of cutting titanium.
Other products from the Productivity Solutions Group include a tool management system, adaptive control and monitoring software, and software modules for optimizing milling feedrates and tool life. Specialized teams within the group are also focused on supporting the machining operations of heavy truck manufacturers and the oil exploration industries.
In 2007, Maus SpA, part of the Carraro Group and based in Padua, Italy, entered into a formal agreement with Tal Manufacturing Solutions Ltd., the machine building group of Tata Motors Ltd., both based in Pune, India, to build vertical turning centers for various metalworking concerns.
Recently, Maus introduced the first machine produced by this alliance, the Vertiturn VTC, a fully featured CNC vertical turning center. The machine sports a cast-iron base, CAD-optimized rigid construction, high-precision linear motion guideways for the X and Y axes, 5,000-rpm spindle for machining large parts and difficult materials, 18-position tool changer, live tooling and an available automatic rotary pallet changer.
With a Siemens 810D CNC and absolute encoders in both axes, the Vertiturn’s axis travels run 31.5 in. in X and 27.56 in. in Y. Also onboard the machine are telescoping steel way covers, high-capacity coolant system and pre-loaded C3 class precision ballscrews. The machines are available in the United States through Maus USA (www.maus.it).
