Workholding specialist, Leader Chuck Systems, has expanded its product portfolio during 2012, with the addition of high precision power chucks and rotary cylinders from Autogrip. As well as adding the products from this new principal, many new products were also announced by the company’s established equipment providers, Bison and Hainbuch.
Leader has exclusive responsibility for the sale of Autogrip’s extensive range of high precision power chucks and rotary cylinders in the UK. This includes pre-sales technical support, stocks of popular items and spare parts being held by Leader at its extensive logistics facility in Leamington Spa.
For bar feed or billet loading precision turning applications Autogrip has a range of through-bore and closed centre standard and long stroke 2-, 3- and 4-jaw power chucks, designed to operate at up to 8,000 rpm. For drilling, milling, grinding and other machining operations, a range of 3-jaw stationary power chucks is available. All the chucks are produced from hardened and ground steel and feature direct lubrication.
All Autogrip hydraulic rotary cylinders are constructed from light-weight materials, with through-bore and closed centre workholding solutions offering class-leading performance characteristics.
Managing Director, Mark Jones, says: “Autogrip has an established reputation for producing high quality workholding products, manufacturing power chucks and hydraulic rotary cylinders for a number of world class OEM machine tool builders.”
Polish workholding manufacturer, Bison-Bial was founded in 1948, and is Poland’s largest manufacturer of machine tool ancillary products. From inception the company manufactured both bench and machine vices and, in 1950, started to produce lathe chucks. Offering cost-effective solutions, Bison products are sold in more than 50 countries around the world and are renowned for high-quality, durability, precision and value-for-money.
Mark Jones says: “The quality and range of the Bison’s manual chucks is exceptional. Offering a cost-effective workholding solution the products are extremely well engineered, accurate and robust. And, while the economic climate is improving manufacturing companies still have to consider each investment decision carefully. So the Bison range provides an ideal cost-based alternative.”
Industry-specific products like the oil country chucks designed and produced by Bison provide focused workholding solutions, and highlight how the company listens to its customers and develops robust and efficient answers to the manufacturing problems they face. These high quality oil country chucks are ideally suited to the oil, gas and petrochemical industry sectors for customers with demanding workholding applications. The extensive range of large through-hole chucks provides a solution for any manufacturer turning long, large diameter parts.
Mark Jones says: “Heavy-duty oil country chucks are designed as an addition to the Bison chuck range. The chucks are dedicated to finishing, medium duty and heavy duty machining applications. Bison oil country chucks are available to suit most spindle mount designs and the most popular sizes are stocked in our warehouse.”
Leader Chuck Systems also offers UK engineering companies’ access to the Bison range of high quality quick change toolposts. Like the vice and chuck ranges that have already become popular with precision engineering businesses in the UK, the quick change toolposts will provide the ideal solution for turning applications in many industry sectors.
In production engineering anything that can save time or removes an operation also saves money. Bison’s quick change toolposts allow quick and easy set ups, providing a flexible approach to machining and giving significant savings in set up times. Up to three tools can be used per set up and the indexing facility allows a single tool to be used for turning, facing and chamfering. Also, fast and simple centre height adjustment eliminates the need for packing pieces. While the quick change toolpost offers benefits within a production environment it is equally adept with one off jobs that cannot be set up for production.
For a safe, precise and productive manufacturing process a regular check of the actual clamping force being achieved is indispensable. To address this demand, Hainbuch has launched the extremely capable and easy to use TESTit clamping force gauge. Capable of measuring clamping forces greater than 200kN the TESTit is the only device currently capable of measuring internal and external workholding systems, such as mandrels and manual/powered jaw or collet chucks.
In operation, the new TESTit gauge is completely wireless with all the clamping force values transmitted via Bluetooth to a display device, such as a smart phone, desktop or tablet PC, or PDA with the appropriate software installed. Featuring automatic sensor recognition and a Li-ion rechargeable battery for more than 5 hours of operating time, the TESTit clamping force gauge can be used to measure stationary or rotating holding forces both internally and externally.
“In the face of global competition manufacturers have to optimise every machining process. Using the new TESTit clamping force gauge the efficiency of any fixturing will be maximised. If you cannot measure something, you cannot control it – so specific clamping measurement data should be demanded by industry,” concludes Mark Jones.
