Advanced Automation in Bar Feeders Enhances CNC Lathe Efficiency

Bar Feeder (Lathe Bar Feeder)

In the machine tool industry, an automatic bar feeder is a machine used to automatically pull in the material on a CNC lathe or turning center. The material is usually solid bars, rods, or round counterparts. The machined parts are cut and new materials must be continuously fed into the machine on the production line.

 

Functionality

Automatic bar feeders are commonly used in CNC lathe operations, and they automatically draw materials such as bars from a clamping chuck driven by the spindle. Therefore, they can also replace bar pullers on NC or CNC lathes. The clamping chuck is directly installed in the turret or the bar holder of the lathe to improve stability.

Regarding the classification of the feeding mechanisms, there are two types of bar feeders for lathes. The selection depends on the structure of the machine. The bar feeder can start from the X-axis (radius) or the Z-axis (spindle phase).

 

Machine composition

The housing and body of the bar feeder are usually made of iron, aluminum, or steel, and the top jaws are made of case hardened steel to withstand the hardness of the bar. When the bar is made of special materials and the durability, fragility, or flexibility of the jaws is relatively poor, the jaws may need to be replaced.

 

Development

The history of the development of bar feeders began with the advent of CNC lathes in the 1980s. At that time, the lathes controlled by the CNC system could produce higher output than before, so the traditional manual feeding was no longer enough. At this time, the lathe was started to be used for economical and batch production.

The task of the advanced bar feeders is to pull the bars into the lathe, and the field operator does not need to feed the operating machine every time. Through the CNC control system of the lathe, we can ensure the reliability of each step, such as moving the turret to the material, opening the clamping chuck, pulling in the material, clamping the chuck, and moving the turret away with the bar puller.

 

Coordination with bar stock (warehouse)

Every transmission needs the load. Bar stock is a common form of purified metal that workers use in production lines to manufacture metal parts and products. The bar stock can have a variety of shapes and lengths.

The most common bar shapes are solid round, rectangular, square, and hexagonal. The bar is characterized by a closed convex cross-section, so any pipe, angle stock, and different diameter materials can be considered as a bar. Bars are made into a final product through a series of sawing, turning, milling, drilling, and grinding processes, and their appearance is usually quite different from the original material.  

In some cases, a series of processes can be partially automated through specialized equipment. The specialized equipment feeds the raw material to the appropriate processing machines and a series of mutually compatible production lines. The automated production line will definitely reduce the dependence on manpower to a certain extent so that the onsite workers have more available time.

 

Metal material

Steel or aluminum plants can produce long strips of various sizes and shapes. These strips are cut into segments and cooled. These segments are the bar stock in the processing factory. Here, we provide a similar analogy. In the process of making noodles, the dough pieces are first extruded into various cross-sectional shapes with the same size and diameter, and then they are cut into certain length segments with a knife, placed to dry, and consolidated. These dough segments can then be turned into strips, tubes, or various complex shapes.

The same is true for metal bar stock management. The three most common shapes are solid round bars, rectangular bars and square bars, and hexagonal bars. The center of the tubular bar is hollow. In industrial applications, the tubular bar must have a specified outer diameter and inner diameter. Therefore, the thickness of the pipe wall can also be specified for the turning process and does not require drilling and rough boring.