Deep-Hole Drilling and Milling Machines Streamline Moldmaking

In booth 530 at Amerimold 2018, UNISIG features its USC and USC-M Series machines that combine deep-hole drilling and milling capabilities, which the company says enable mold shops to reduce setup time, increase accuracy and eliminate mold design restrictions. The USC Series column-type machines generate highly accurate holes up to 1.5" in diameter in large workpieces. They are available in table-weight capacities ranging to 50 tons and are suitable for mold plates and frack pumps.

These machines enable manufacturers to process large and small parts with four-sided machining capability in a single setup. The USC-M series machines use two independent spindles: one is for gundrilling and BTA drilling and the other is a second CAT 50 machining spindle. When this additional capability is combined with a rotary workpiece table and programmable headstock inclination, accurate deep-hole drilling and all standard high-performance machining capabilities are available within the working envelope of the system. The seven axes of control on the M-Series machines use the B, A, X, Y and Z axes for five-axis machining operations, the W-axis for the combined gundrilling and BTA deep-hole drilling spindle and the U-axis for machining. This provides 3+2 machining to make deep-hole drilling and machining of compound angles faster and easier and improves productivity and throughput by reducing setups and eliminating transfers to multiple machines. In fact, the company says that using a deep-hole drilling headstock capable of conventional gundrilling and BTA high-performance drilling has proven to be five to seven times faster than gundrilling alone. For increased part-processing capability, milling spindles and rotary tables are also available as options with USC Series machines.

UNISIG engineers and manufactures both the USC and USC-M series in the United States with high-performance components. The company also offers a full complement of options for these machines to further enhance their milling and machining functions, including full-enclosure guarding, a 120-position automatic tool changer, a laser tool pre-setter and probing.