The company operates in Finland and belongs to one of the world's leading manufacturers of cutting-edge sterilizers and water purification equipment for the pharmaceutical industry. The machines manufactured, about 150 units per year, are made of acid-proof stainless steel in order to obtain an ultra clean production and they are used to sterilize various instruments of the pharmaceutical industry (such as bags or spare parts). At the same time, the company boasts another important product line related to the equipment for WFI (Water for Injection) water production, ultrapure distilled water that can be injected into the human blood stream.
CUSTOMER'S NEEDS
Due to the sector in which the customer operates, the requirements for the manufacturing of the equipment and machines for the pharmaceutical industry are strict and each production unit is tested with the utmost care. Nevertheless, the materials used at the base of the manufacturing of such machines are similar to those used in the mechanical industry, such as acid-proof stainless steel. Among the main raw materials used by the customer in condensers for steam generators there are 14x1 AISI 316L tubes, with about 60 kilometers of tubes used per year. These tubes must be straight, round, scratches and burrs free, so finding the right sawing machine to cut them is quite an ambitious challenge.
The customer already had a circular sawing machine to execute bundle cutting on this material. However, cut finishing was not precise and operators had to continuosly change the blades in order to ensure the quality of the cut.
PROPOSED SOLUTION
With the aim of bringing the old equipment back to work properly, the customer had initially decided to view our semi-automatic circular sawing machine Tiger 352 Sx Evo, ideal for steel cutting from -45° to +60° with blade rotation at four speeds (standard 15/30/45/90 rpm; optional 30/60/90/180 rpm) that allows to execute efficient cuts. Taking into consideration the requirements of the customer’s sector, together with our local dealer we then decided to offer the Tiger 372 Sx Evo, a more performing version of the Tiger 352, and to carry out several cutting tests on the customer’s material to show him the advantages of this sawing machine.
Following the tests carried out on a bundle of nine AISI 316L tubes with a diameter of 14mm, the customer was impressed both by the quality of the cutting surfaces and by one of the main features of the sawing machine, the infinite variable saw blade speed through inverter (instead of the four fixed speeds of the Tiger 352 Sx Evo).
Why the semi-automatic circular sawing machine Tiger 372 Sx Evo
Tiger 372 Sx Evo belongs to our range of electropneumatic semi-automatic vertical sawing machines with HSS circular blade and it is ideal to cut steels mitering from -45° to +60°.
- The cast-iron structure absorbs vibrations and ensures greater cutting stability and longer blade life.
- The three-stage gear transmission allows to perform high-speed cuts and ensures longer blade life.
- The vertical pneumatic vice ensures an efficient and safe clamping even in case of tube cutting.
- The possibility to set the saw head stroke limits reduces cutting time.
- The adjustable steel anti-burr device clamps the material in the infeed and outfeed, thus granting a burr-free cut.
- Engraved metric scale and flip-over stop are the perfect solution for precision and serial cuts at any length.
FINAL CUSTOMIZATION
In order to fully meet the customer's specific production requirements, we had to customize the Tiger 372 Sx Evo standard model, thus creating a "turnkey" customized machine.
The tubes used in the customer’s products must have a completely intact surface and this leads to some requirements related to the material feeding side: consequently, we equipped the material loading roller conveyor with V-rollers covered with teflon. Moreover, according to the customer's preferences, we supplied teflon clamping jaws instead of the traditional ones made in steel.
Another customization was made on the steel circular blade flange by making a larger diameter than the standard one. This is due to the use of a thinner covered HSS blade that aims to drastically reduce the blade wobbling, thus granting a good quality cutting surface and longer blade life.
Finally, the third and last customization was to change the
material feeding direction from right to left.
