Sicmat, a manufacturer of gear finishing machine tools for the automotive industry, has developed Grono 250, a gear honing machine which features a high performance 11-axis CNC technology from NUM and an innovative gear honing wheel equipped with external teeth.
The Grono 250 uses an innovative gear honing wheel with external teeth.
The machine offers the accuracy of gear shaving and prevents the requirement for shaving and grinding phases. Grono 250 sets a new standard for post-hardening fine gear finishing. The company will discuss the exclusive cost-saving benefits of the Grono 250 machine at the 2012 International Manufacturing Technology Show that will be held in Chicago.
In general, shaving has to be carried out before the workpiece is case hardened by using heat treatment process and then heat-induced deformation has to be corrected by honing or grinding. Hence, Sicmat started to develop a high performance honing machine that will help gear manufacturers to speed up production throughput by decreasing the number of process stages. The company believed that by utilizing a honing wheel, the precision of the process can be improved to a greater extent so that it can substitute gear shaving in several applications. This offers additional advantages, such as much simpler set up and lower tooling costs.
Grono 250 includes 11 motion axes with three being fixed on an associated robotic loader. These motion axes are controlled by a NUM Flexium CNC system and the motors are driven by NUMDrive C servodrives. The total system is fitted with two NUM MDLL 3050 power supplies, each rated at 50 kW continuous. With the use of Grono 250 machine, every stage of the gear honing process is automated for high efficiency.