Protomatic Adds a Mazak Quick Turn Machine to Speed Things Up

There is nothing like the need to add more capacity and we at Protomatic thank all of our customers for helping us grow. To continue providing top-quality customer service, we recently added a new Mazak Quick Turn (manufactured in USA) to our arsenal. This machine enables us to offer several advanced machining features such as re-threading, remote auto centering for bar stock loading, and load controlled auto pecking for drilling.

These features offer an incremental decrease in our cycle times, which improves our capacity and assures your delivery is on time. With a 35hp main spindle, this is also a high-horsepower machine which enables heavy roughing cuts for reducing cycle times.

A 3” spindle bore will accommodate fairly large bar stock.  With a maximum spindle speed of 5000rpm, we can generate a surface cutting speed of 3900sfm (surface feet per minute). Many of the exotic aerospace and medical materials that we work with cannot be machined at that speed, but it’s good to have that ability for easier materials.

This machine is equipped with a VDI turret which is a significant improvement over traditional “bolt on” drum turrets. The VDI turret gives the machine less tool interference and, as a result, a bigger machining diameter. A drum turret for this machine has a tool holder area on the turret of about a 10” diameter.  The VDI turret has a 13” working area which reduces tool change time and improves tool positioning accuracy. The VDI turret also allows for a 7.5hp milling head at 6000rpm on this lathe.

The “Voice Advisor” software will inform the machinist that “tool life is over” or “please refill the lubricant”. At the time of this newsletter, we’re not sure if the Voice Advisor is such a great idea since our machinists often operate several machines simultaneously. “Who said that?” We’ll see.

All in all, we’re looking forward to the future with this state-of-the-art machine and our increased capacity for making parts that save lives.