b'Swiss SuccessSwiss. Making larger parts would require bars so large that vibration would become a major problem at a higher machine rpm, said National Sales Manager Ed Garber of Star CNC Machine Tool Corp. in Roslyn Heights, New York.Another limitation on the size of Swiss parts is the size of the ma-chines, which are usually small and compact. Therefore, Swiss machin-ing would not be suitable for parts more than 203 mm (8") long, Pe-trisko said.Swiss machines are particularly good at turning out small, mass-producedparts,saidEngineer Jacques Houle of Milldale, Con-necticut-based Century Tool & De-sign Inc., which designs and manu-factures inserted cutting tools. He said Swiss machines often are used to make parts less than 12.7 mm (0.5") in diameter for the aerospace and medical industries, as well as small parts in cellphones. Swiss is also suitable for parts with very tight tolerances, he said.The biggest boom in business for Swiss machinestypically require either a mill-turn machine or a multi-in the past 20 years has been in the medical market be- operational process, said Swiss Product Specialist cause so many of those parts are small and precise,Chris Leclerc of Tolland, Connecticut-based CNC Soft-said Garber, who mentioned little screws for orthope- ware Inc., a CAM software developer.dic implants as an example.When machining medical and aerospace parts, youSwiss Advantagesdont have a large window for tolerances, Petrisko said. Swiss machines have come a long way in the nearly He has seen many cases where the tolerance for30 years that Leclerc has used them.these parts was 0.0051 mm (0.0002") for an OD or ID.The first one I ran did not have a live tool on it, he But he said very tight tolerance requirements can besaid. It had one eight-station turret and didnt even met thanks to the rigidity offered by Swiss machines. have a pickoff spindle. Now there are machines with In addition to small parts, todays Swiss machines canthree turrets, two spindles and power tools every-tackle complex components. where, as well as five-axis (capability). As Swiss ma-Some Swiss machines are now equipped with ma- chines keep evolving into more powerful machines that chining heads for five-axis work to do things that wouldcan complete a part without multiple operations and do it in faster cycle times, people start realizing they about the authorneed to own a Swiss.Leclerc said the speed of Swiss machining is due in William Leventon is a contributingpart to the fact that the workpiece, guide bushing and writer for CTE. Contact him at 609- tools are contained in a small space, which speeds up 926-6447 or [email protected]. tool indexing. Another important factor is that ma-chining can be done by both the main spindle and the 22SEPTEMBER 2020Swiss.indd 22 8/14/20 4:21 PM'