TPT September 2010

B ending & E nd F orming

Automatic correction on free-form bending machines

Demand for free-form tubes is generated from all areas of industry, rather than primarily from the furniture business as in the past. As a result, more tube benders need measuring systems that take into account the particularities of complex free- form tubing. Aicon’s TubeInspect optical measure- ment system carries out very precise testing of free-form tube geometries with the help of high-resolution digital cameras. Aicon now also offers an additional interface that connects TubeInspect directly with the

free-form bending machine. This results in automatic correction values being identified for the formed tubes and transmitted to the bending machine, and reduces set- up time. Close cooperation with bending machine manufacturer Wafios made this new development possible. In contrast to tubes manufactured conventionally by draw bending, which consist of calculated lines and bends and feature constant radii, free-form tubes manufactured by push bending have a completely different set of parameters. In a CAD system they are often shown as a spline, a tube geometry in which, theoretically, at any point a different radius can exist. When correction takes place on a conventional bending machine, only the LRA values at the individual bending points have to be corrected. In comparison to this, to achieve the desired tube geometry using free-form bending, a multitude of different settings on the bending machine have to be adjusted and the bend radii optimised until the exact

tube form has been bent. This set-up has – to date – been a very time-consuming process with high material usage, so both automation and shortening of the process were the two main aims. TubeInspect’s newly developed interface enables smooth communication between the bending machine and the measurement system. Aicon 3D Systems GmbH – Germany Fax: +49 531 58 000 60 Free-form tube placed in the TubeInspect measuring cell

Aicon’s TubeInspect

Email: info@aicon.de Website: www.aicon.de Wafios AG – Germany Fax: +49 71 2149 1209 Website: www.wafios.de

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