Tube bending machine manufacturer Unison will be demonstrating the breadth of technology that it provides for right-first-time manufacture of precision tubular parts at FABTECH, according to a company spokesperson. Exhibit highlights include the first showing in the U.S. of a manually-powered, CNC-controlled tube bender for low volume work, advanced 3D simulation software for efficient offline development of production-ready bending programs, and a versatile all-electric machine from the company's Breeze range of tube benders.
The main exhibit at Unison's booth will be an all-electric Breeze machine suitable for bending tubes and pipes up to 2" in diameter. According to the company, the machine will incorporate multi-radius/multi-stack tooling, allowing Unison to demonstrate its ability to create complex tubular part shapes with multiple tightly-spaced bends efficiently and with minimal set-up time, operator involvement or material scrap. These attributes make this type of machine popular with companies handling high volume, small batch size production of parts, especially if they are using expensive specialist materials such as titanium or Inconel. All of the machine's motion axes, including its direct acting clamp and pressure dies, feature CNC controlled precision servomotors to facilitate fully automatic set-up and help ensure accurate and repeatable bending.
Unison will also show a new version of its EvBend 1000 low-cost tube bender, which is currently under development. Designed specifically for precision low-volume manufacturing and prototyping applications, this manually operated CNC tube bender will incorporate a new high performance controller featuring an intuitive touch-sensitive user interface and network interfaces for ready integration with other manufacturing machines and CAD systems.
Another key element of Unison's 2014 exhibit will be advances in CAD/CAM software for tube bending projects. To help customers shorten the time needed to create production programs - and quote on new jobs - Unison will demonstrate the latest version of its advanced 3D simulator, Opt2Sim. According to the company, this PC-based simulation software enables users to fully analyze, optimize and validate control programs for bending machines easily and without access to the physical machine. Featuring a proprietary precision physics engine with an accuracy of +/- 0.005 mm, the simulator uses artificial intelligence techniques to evaluate the most efficient way of bending a part on a target machine, automatically modifying the YBC bending data as necessary to create error-free production-ready programs.
Based on true CAD models of real machines, the software simulates every moving component, with comprehensive monitoring to guard against tube collision. Realistic imagery enables users to visualize the entire bending sequence in detail and in real-time. The latest version of Opt2Sim will simulate any model from Unison's Breeze range of all-electric tube benders, which covers tube sizes from 5/8" to 7", and when running in high speed batch mode can typically process about 100 bending programs an hour.
For more information contact:
Unison Ltd.
Faroe House
Thornburgh Road, Scarborough
YO11 3UY, UK
+44 (0)1723 582868
enquiries@unisonltd.com
www.unisonltd.com
Kent Horn
Horn Machine Tools
Unison North America
40455 Brickyard Drive
Madera, CA 93636
559-431-4131
sales@hornmachinetools.com
www.hornmachinetools.com
FABTECH Booth C564