TPT November 2010

T echnology U pdate

Measuring 3D bent profiles

SOLUTIONS FOR AUTOMOTIVE T-DRILL offers full range of fabrication solutions for your tube forming and cutting applications for automotive industry.

PROFILES have become more important for the industry in recent years. Architecture and design offices, engineers and engine manufacturers work on many different variations of innovative profile techniques, and solutions for process optimised bending tests are daily tasks. TeZetCAD from TeZet is able to measure not only freeform bent round tubes but also freeform bent profiles. Profiles are more versatile than tubes, and provide more opportunities in applications and more operational rigidity, referring to machining and design projects, than the traditional round tube. Supplementary functions can be integrated into a profile, for example supporting surfaces or screw-on parts, sealing or joining functions, or locating surfaces as formclosures.Three-dimensional transformation acts as an additional challenge. Possibilities and applications are so widely spread that the follow up of their realisation into production is not straightforward. Advanced engineering of the automotive, aviation, aeronautics and nautical industries, amongst others, collaborate with different national and international universities and research and development companies, to be able to assure a smooth bending production. The three-dimensional transformation of freeform bent profiles is more complex than that of tubes. A tube has a round cross-section, and may get a light ovality because of the deformation, but in the end the centreline stays the same. Non-circular profiles are as different as the applications for which they are designed. They may be symmetric or asymmetric, may have only one chamber (square, rectangle, hexagon) or multiple chambers. The deformation of the profile outlines and the cross-sections of asymmetric chambers may change more than those of a round tube. In TeZetCAD, freeform bent profiles are measured in a tactile manner, and not with a laser as freeform bent tubes. If the user has long profiles and ‘loses its way’ with the tactile probe on the material, he can go back or just start a replay measurement of the lost path, without interruption of the whole measurement. The established method of leap-frogging – if the parts are longer than the workspace of the measuring device – is possible without losing the coordinate system and without interruption of the measurement. TeZet Technik AG – Switzerland Fax: +41 56 2492878

S54 The T-DRILL collaring method enables reliable and easy T-joining of tubes. It is cost-effective solution for fluid carrying systems being used in heating, cooling and power steering tubing.

TCC  Series The T-DRILL chipless rotary tube Cut-Off systems provides a highly automated, fast and accurate method for cutting small diameter tubes to length from coils or straight lengths. In-line Endformers are available for all common end forms in copper, aluminum and steel.

Email: leistritz@tezet.com Website: www.tezet.com

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Measured 3D profile

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N ovember 2010

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