Turbines More Intelligently Ground

For centuries, machines were operated solely by people. For workpiece machining this means: the workpiece quality was only ever as good as the machine’s stability and reliability, plus the operator’s experience and ability. Thanks to the use of CNC-driven machines and sophisticated software combined with modern measuring and drive technology, today improved processes can be operated, with high reliability and reproducibility in quality ranges that were still inconceivable just a few years ago. This also applies for the manufacture of stepped and profile tools, for example. Pine tree cutters and thread milling drills, as well as micro-tools for the medical sector, can only be manufactured on high-precision grinding machines thanks to modern software.

When manufacturing guide vanes for aircraft turbines, modern-day software likewise simplifies and accelerates the production process. These components used to be machined in a time-consuming process on large horizontal rotating grinding tables. So the trend towards ever-larger engines necessitated round tables with diameters of up to two-and-a-half meters. The grinding centers in the production operation needed a correspondingly large amount of space. Meanwhile, thanks to the CNC technology and software developed by Blohm, they can be manufactured quickly, easily and reliably on significantly smaller five-axis complete machining centers.

The big advantage here is that four CNC centers will fit on the footprint of one horizontal rotating grinding machine. Moreover, this increases flexibility for the user, who can utilize the capacity of these machines efficiently with different-sized parts, depending on the order situation. Users are demanding programs that will allow them to manufacture complex parts as cheaply and quickly as possible. At the same time, the precision requirements for the workpieces are increasingly stringent. While 0.01 millimeters was sufficient a few years ago, today precisions of under 0.005 millimeters are the rule. In order to achieve this precision, however, application software, hardware and machine control must harmonize with each other. This is only possible if the software developer has the relevant expertise and possesses a sound knowledge of mathematics, control systems and grinding technology.

Finding appropriately specialized staff is a challenge. In the Product Engineering Department at Studer, physicists, mathematicians and engineers are employed, many of them on sandwich courses and with their finger on the pulse of research in the universities. They developed the StuderTechnology computer, which stores the company’s entire grinding expertise in a database and immediately suggests the optimal setting for the machining parameters in every new production job, irrespective of the operator’s knowledge.

The StuderGrind grinding software and all other software modules access this when programming a new grinding process. The advantages are much shorter changeover and set-up times without rejects, meaning optimal production results from the outset. It is a similar story at Walter: here the ToolStudio software is available for virtual programming and machining, as well as an extensive database of knowledge for tool grinding. When creating these software packages, the companies in the Schleifring Group work closely together with control system manufacturers, universities and research organizations, as well as their sister companies in the group. The result is programs such as the Heureka setting aid from Mikrosa or Ewag LaserSoft for controlling laser and machine on the Ewag Laser Line. Blohm, Ewag and Jung offer a programming aid called “Grips” for profiling grinding wheels and are developing grinding programs to suit individual workpiece families for the specific application concerned. Common to all software solutions developed by the Schleifring Group are simple, intuitive operation and a largely familiar Windows-based user interface.

But these software solutions by no means mark the end of the development thrust. The importance of grinding software will increase, because in future it will be the most significant distinguishing feature in competition. The Schleifring companies take very different approaches in the further development of their software solutions. Ewag is working on further standardization of its software, Walter is focusing on profile tools and regrinding, while Studer, with Studer Training and Programming, is working on a program which will enable customers to execute “grinding dry runs” on a laptop. Blohm Jung is currently performing initial tests for the automatic calibration of workpieces using a 3D scan; this will enable the machine to select the appropriate grinding program with the aid of the CAD drawing, and then grind the workpiece from the drawing.

But one thing is common to all developments: the more complex the software processes running in the background become, the simpler it is to operate the machine.