Starrag has announced the second – and larger capacity – member of its new Heckert range with the launch of the Heckert T55 five-axis horizontal machining centre for the multi-tasking and complete machining of workpieces weighing up to 700 kgs.
The machine can perform single set-up turning, milling, drilling, gearcutting/skiving and pointing to accuracies down to three microns due to the interaction between its temperature- and vibration-stable mineral cast machine bed and the double symmetrically-mounted rotary drive unit.
Drive elements such as planet carriers and wheel hub drives for commercial vehicles, agricultural machinery and industrial applications are typical applications, says Starrag.
With pallets of 500 mm x 630 mm and X, Y and Z axes travels of 850 mm, 1,020 mm and 1,000 mm, respectively, the T55 is of compact, robust design and has a low-vibration rotary drive unit specially designed for turning operations – plus a highly dynamic main 72 kW spindle rated at 15,000 revs/min and 292 Nm. Acceleration rates are up to 10 m/sec² and rapid traverse is 80 m/min. The NC rotating table is rated at 900 revs/min and the HSK-T100 toolholder also encourages high chip removal rates.
While the T55 can machine components with a workpiece contour of 900 mm, chip-to-chip time is only 4.3 sec and pallet change time is 14.5 sec. Like its smaller stablemate (the T45), the new T55 is ergonomic, and easy and reliable to operate, and workpiece loading is easily automated by pallet storage units or robots.
Indeed, the success of a two-T45 machine cell with robot load/unload saw a drive manufacturer double productivity, halve overall machine footprint and reduce tool and handling costs by 40% could easily be mirrored by the T55 on larger workpieces, such as planet carriers or wheel hub drives, suggests Starrag.
