Medical
New Vises Decrease Part Setup Time
During heavy milling operations, parts tended to creep upward and out of alignment within the vise jaws at this shop in Minnesota. Small chips got imbedded between the part and vise jaws, causing all kinds of problems. The company couldn’t operate its new Bridgeport VMC 1000 XP3 to its full potential on this part project, so the company's owner looked for a better workholding solution.
Read MoreAre You Medical OEM Material?
As the baby-boomer generation inexorably falls apart, screws, plates, rods and less invasive surgical tools are increasingly available to put "humpty" back together again. A question for many precision part makers is, "How do I get into the medical machining game?" To find out, we talked to a major OEM about its supplier selection criteria.
Read MoreSoftware Meets Shop's Multitasking Machine Programming Needs
Structure Medical is not new to the medical supply industry; it is a spin-off of a company called Inovo, which is a manufacturer of oxygen regulators used in hospitals, nursing homes and the like. Inovo’s principals had been looking for growth opportunities.
Read MoreForming Hex Holes For Bone Screws
Close tolerances and quality surface finish are critical in successful medical machining. To meet such requirements in broaching titanium and stainless steel bone screws, with machined depths ranging anywhere between 0.080 and 0.150 inches, Hassay Savage Company (Turners Falls, Massachusetts) has recently developed an indexing-broach process using four-point or two-point punch broaches for use in Swiss-type CNC lathes.
Read MoreRotary Broaching 101
There continues to be new ways of driving fasteners into the materials they are intended to hold together.
Read MoreThread Whirling On The Subspindle
The screw machine industry, not surprisingly, started out making screws. Then, screw machines were used to make almost everything but screws—electrical components, aerospace fasteners, plumbing connections and thousands of other kinds of parts.
Read MoreMedical Machining: Speed And Accuracy Win Orders
To handle the steady flow of incoming orders, this company has prepared itself by building facilities and purchasing equipment that are able to complete its jobs quickly and efficiently.
Read MoreBoning Up On Thread Whirling's Advantages
Thread whirling attachments installed on this bone screw maker's Swiss screw machines prove to be just the right prescription for the company's mix of screw sizes and run quantities.
Read MoreImplanting Productivity
With the new software, programming is done off-line at the company with completed programs being sent to the machine. As result, setup time is reduced because it takes very little to prove out the program at the machine. Before implementing the system, a lot more time was spent at the machine writing and editing the program before the first part was made.
Read MoreComplex Angular Dental Implants...on Multi-Axis Automatic
Just like a car or a machine, the human body benefits from the technological progress of small parts turning equipment. Precision and stringent requirements for safety and stability are essential in the medical industry. In fact, the demands made on surgical screws (bone screws, maxillary-facial screws, implants and so on) and bio-implants can be much greater for the human body than for many industrial and commercial product applications.
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