Insufficient degree of automation in micro-machining
Lacking automation capabilities in micro-machining are the reason for sustained discrepancies between research and laboratory results and the results gained in practical operation. While structural geometries of less than 1 µm are state-of-the-art in research institutions, there are only few industrial production facilities where such accuracies can be achieved in a reproducible manner.
There are many causes for this problem: lacking staff qualification, unknown process characteristics or complicated interactions between operating equipment, workpiece and tool. In general it can be stated that precision machining today is an “art”, and only highly-qualified staff members at the level of graduate engineers are capable of producing a constantly high quality, although a relatively high reject rate still is encountered.
New concepts are required, which enable economic production with less qualified staff at the level of skilled workers. However, this would necessitate a higher degree of automation, especially concerning the clamping and setting-up of the workpiece and tool. This step still is performed manually today and takes up about 90% of the total machining time.
The reason for the lack in reproducibility and high time consumption is that presently only the machine components are able to fulfill the accuracy requirements in the µm-range, which are specified by the tolerance chain and process deviation tolerances.
Reproducibility and process capabilities are largely affected by the clamping of workpieces and tools.
Although great effort is taken today to ensure that components are within the required precision classes, tool clamping tolerances of approx. 0.1 µm are limiting factors as far as the physical, process-technological and finally, economical aspects are concerned.
Within the scope of the overall project the principles of a consistent solution are to be found for the planning, implementation, monitoring and Quality Assurance in micro-machining applications. This approach will take into consideration the planning and machining environments in order to develop a practical approach in cooperation with the project partners and to find the degree of reproducibility that is required to ensure quality and economy in micro-manufacturing applications.
The goal of this part of the project is to automate the adjustment of tools and workpieces by integrating the measuring systems into the machine. In this way, not only the precision of important internal and external influencing factors is ensured by “decoupling” important internal and external influencing factors (e.g. tool, clamping system, human operators), but the achieved degree of automation also leads to benefits by saving enormous amounts of time. In addition, the attainable quality no longer depends on the skills or qualification of the operating staff, which ensures higher in-process reliability by preventing improper operation or interpretation errors.
Lacking automation capabilities in micro-machining are the reason for sustained discrepancies between research and laboratory results and the results gained in practical operation. While structural geometries of less than 1 µm are state-of-the-art in research institutions, there are only few industrial production facilities where such accuracies can be achieved in a reproducible manner.
There are many causes for this problem: lacking staff qualification, unknown process characteristics or complicated interactions between operating equipment, workpiece and tool. In general it can be stated that precision machining today is an “art”, and only highly-qualified staff members at the level of graduate engineers are capable of producing a constantly high quality, although a relatively high reject rate still is encountered.
New concepts are required, which enable economic production with less qualified staff at the level of skilled workers. However, this would necessitate a higher degree of automation, especially concerning the clamping and setting-up of the workpiece and tool. This step still is performed manually today and takes up about 90% of the total machining time.
The reason for the lack in reproducibility and high time consumption is that presently only the machine components are able to fulfill the accuracy requirements in the µm-range, which are specified by the tolerance chain and process deviation tolerances.
Reproducibility and process capabilities are largely affected by the clamping of workpieces and tools.
Although great effort is taken today to ensure that components are within the required precision classes, tool clamping tolerances of approx. 0.1 µm are limiting factors as far as the physical, process-technological and finally, economical aspects are concerned.
Within the scope of the overall project the principles of a consistent solution are to be found for the planning, implementation, monitoring and Quality Assurance in micro-machining applications. This approach will take into consideration the planning and machining environments in order to develop a practical approach in cooperation with the project partners and to find the degree of reproducibility that is required to ensure quality and economy in micro-manufacturing applications.
The goal of this part of the project is to automate the adjustment of tools and workpieces by integrating the measuring systems into the machine. In this way, not only the precision of important internal and external influencing factors is ensured by “decoupling” important internal and external influencing factors (e.g. tool, clamping system, human operators), but the achieved degree of automation also leads to benefits by saving enormous amounts of time. In addition, the attainable quality no longer depends on the skills or qualification of the operating staff, which ensures higher in-process reliability by preventing improper operation or interpretation errors.
Project FORCERAMUS
Molding of high-tensile ceramics
by means of ultrashort-pulse beam sources
for the manufacturing of dental prostheses
Target:
Coordination:
Dr Paul Weigl
Polyclinic for Dental Prosthodontics
J.W. Goethe University Frankfurt am Main
Theodor-Stern-Kai 7, Haus 29
60590 Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Tel: +49 69 6301-4787
Fax: +49 69 6301-3927
E-Mail: weigl@em.uni-frankfurt.de
Members:
Read more:
Project Description (in German)
Molding of high-tensile ceramics
by means of ultrashort-pulse beam sources
for the manufacturing of dental prostheses
Target:
- Dentistry: cost-saving, ultra-precise and highly
compatible 3D molding of high-tensile dental
ceramics by using a femtosecond laser - Realization of a femtosecond beam source / machine
tool for economical production of fully ceramic dental
prostheses - Efficient machining strategy
- Integration of the femtosecond laser machine into a fully
automated process chain.
Coordination:
Dr Paul Weigl
Polyclinic for Dental Prosthodontics
J.W. Goethe University Frankfurt am Main
Theodor-Stern-Kai 7, Haus 29
60590 Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Tel: +49 69 6301-4787
Fax: +49 69 6301-3927
E-Mail: weigl@em.uni-frankfurt.de
Members:
- Polytec GmbH
- Jenoptik L.O.S. GmbH
- Kugler GmbH
- Laserzentrum Hannover e.V.
- FGSW mbH
Read more:
Project Description (in German)