In the metalworking industry, a CNC lathe is also referred to as a CNC turning machine, which is a machine tool that rotates a work piece on an axis (usually as the X axis) of rotation to perform various machining operations such as cutting, knurling, sanding, drilling, deformation, facing, and turning. Such machining procedures are conducted with tools that are applied to the work piece and to create an object with symmetry with the axis which is driven by the primary spindle.
One may be curious that how to classify the turning machines? When it’s about the classification of the CNC turning machines, there are mainly two primary types in this category. That is, the vertical lathe, and the horizontal counterparts. For the former, the work piece is fixed (as by clamping force) vertically and the cutting tool is thus installed the same direction so that the machining is conducted vertically.
In the machine tool industry, a CNC lathe is also called a CNC turning machine, that is a machine tool that rotates a work piece on an axis (usually as the X axis) of rotation to perform various machining operations such as cutting, knurling, sanding, drilling, deformation, facing, and turning. Such machining procedures are conducted with tools that are applied to the work piece and to create an object with symmetry with the axis which is driven by the primary spindle.
When it’s about the classification of the CNC turning machines, there are mainly two primary types in this category. That is, the vertical lathe, and the horizontal counterparts. For the former, the work piece is fixed (as by clamping force) vertically and the cutting tool is thus installed the same direction so that the machining is conducted vertically.
In this way, the clamping mechanism is much more rigid and fixed due to the gravity effect compared to the horizontal methodology and manufacturers of vertical turning machines usually made their vertical turning machines into great manufacturing facilities for users in a variety of industrial sectors that pursue for high precision, such as automotive industry, aerospace sector, sport equipment application, and other fields with larger size work pieces.
In addition, vertical clamping mechanism may be achieved with the belt-driven way, and some may be other types of driving mechanisms, while either way works well to the gravity effects. Like other milling machines and machine centers, turning lathes can also be equipped with power tools driven by servo motors or simply conventional motors as well as tool magazines to boost its machining functionality and versatility, granting wider processing possibility to the onsite users in the manufacturing plant. Power turret is a modern and standard accessory of many CNC turning machines, and as one of the most important accessories to the users of CNC lathes, Taiwanese suppliers aim at this business and have developed many well known power turret and power tool companies that supports the demands form lathe users all over the world market.
To modern machining, power turret is one of the most important key to turning machine. Many of these power turrets are driven by single motor with servo features, which can assure the best machining effects and save the optimal energy consumption; at the mean time, they can also provide great rigidity onto the work pieces, rendering an ideal cutting capabilities. Besides, tool magazine and the automatic too changer (ATC) are also the best sellers of Taiwanese machine tool accessory suppliers. Taiwan’s tool magazine and ATC system offers the optimal tool to tool time to customers based on their cycle time engineering, and can help manufacturers keep up with the order demands.
In compared with the global competitors, Taiwanese know how to provide comprehensive services to global customers with the best planning according to the local circumstances, hence the productions that are equipped with the machine tools or accessories are actually face lifted to the latest version that is modern to the order demands. Speaking of the heart of the machine, the Spindles, which works with the chuck and the corresponding hydraulic cylinders are also well developed in Taiwan. Together with the CNC turning machine market, there are a bunch of lathe products and accessories that are widely spread in the world across different industrial sectors and applications. At the same time, the CNC horizontal lathes belong to conventional design that has been developed and massively applied for over a century.
This type of turning model is the oldest one and has been applied the widest in the industrial field. The horizontal nature makes the turning machine easy to be used and maintained, and are used even wider in a lot of industries due to their convenience and structure. Therefore, there is no standard answer to either horizontal or vertical is better for users, but only about the application sectors.
The development of power turret, live tools, automatic pallet changer, and the 4th axis are the current trendy objects that attract people’s eyes due to their versatility once installed onto the lathe machines. For these accessories to be exploited well, the turning machines are given the milling functionality and thus the turning could be changed to turning center, or say, the turn-mill center, which is greatly different from a common turning machine at many aspects.
Therefore, the current trend in the industry is to offer customers with more optimal items while they are choosing their lathe machines, making their production line more agile in the aspect of manufacturing. Besides, industrial sensors are recently a new technological revolution for not only lathe machines but also to all kinds of machine tools that help manufacturers to realize the goal of smart manufacturing. While this state-of-the-art is on its way to success, the development in this field is still under versatile research procedure.
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