Challenge

The arthroscopic shaver teeth are commonly produced by conventional abrasive grinding, wire EDM, or laser cutting; slow processes resulting in long cycle times. EDM and laser cutting burn away the metal at high temperatures leaving changes to the metal surface including a heat affected zone, recast, and slag. Laser cutting requires significant post processing to produce an acceptable sharp edge and surface finish. Conventional grinding requires a secondary process of deburring without damaging the cutting edge. It also involves frequent wheel dressing to maintain the correct form.

Design a process that can cut shaver teeth burr free, without recast, slag, or heat damage that improves cycle times.

Challenge

Tubes are cut one at a time using a standard abrasive cutting saw which leaves burrs. Requires secondary process of wire brushing and tumbling to deburr tubes and remove any debris. Older machines have poor accuracy and outdated safety features. Debris from abrasive cuts cause frequent maintenance issues.

Design a process that can cut multiple tubes burr free simultaneously without damage from debris. Reduce the number of steps in the production process. Provide a machine that won’t deteriorate over time.

Challenge: A tier one automotive fastener supplier needed to grind bolts for a major automotive company automatically at high volume, with a high degree of precision.The customer’s existing process was outsourced and was running one part at a time, resulting in a higher cost for our customer.In addition, quality and consistency of the components post grind was an issue.

Challenge: A food equipment manufacturer approached Glebar to improve productivity and reduce costs for their food filler machines. The metal spout requires grinding for several reasons. They come in contact with food, therefore requiring a smooth finish for sanitary purposes. The tubes are often exchanged on the machines to dispense various size pastries. Also, the mating housing for the spouts must be a close fit to prevent leaking and to keep appropriate content pressure to dispense the precise amounts.  Eight different components needed to be ground, all approximately four-inches in length, however they varied in diameters and weight. The variation of part geometries posed the biggest feeding challenge. Rapid changeover of grinding wheels was important to reduce setup time between the components. 

Challenge: To grind a ceramic insulator body for lean burn gas engines for use in cogeneration plants and containerized power generation units. Customer required four diameters as well multiple compound angles and radii to be ground concentric to the ID within .003”.

Challenge: Lack of a clear, simple method to inspect the geometric profile of many components. Existing systems are slow, unreliable, and complex to operate.

Challenge: Lack of a clear, simple method to inspect the geometric profile of many components. Existing systems are slow, unreliable, and complex to operate.

Challenge: Lack of a clear, simple method to inspect the geometric profile of many components. Existing systems are slow, unreliable, and complex to operate.

Challenge:  To size thin walled tubing used for surgical instruments insuring a mirror like 3Ra finish.

Challenge: To process trocar points automatically where small lot sizes require frequent equipment changeover. 

Challenge: To eliminate additional processes in the production of guidewires. The conventional process uses several machines to profile a shape in an interventional guidewire.

Challenge: A Medical device customer needed to rapidly changeover between a family of Nitinol guidewires having various lengths and geometries. Since the geometry of the components varied in length, the customer needed to change tooling over frequently, a process that can take up to 4 hours. Also, rapidly removing over 30% of the the material as it thrufeeds into the machine accelerated tool wear on the existing system and as tooling degrades, dimensional integrity suffers.

Challenge: To mass produce golf ball cores at a low cost, while holding tight tolerances with maximum throughput.