The lathe is a machine tool that primarily uses a lathe tool to turn a rotating workpiece. On the lathe can also be used to drill, reaming drills, reamers, taps, plate teeth and knurling tools and other corresponding processing.
The development of lathe
Ancient lathe is by hand or foot pedal, through the rope to make the workpiece rotating, and holding the tool and cutting. 1797, the British mechanical inventor Mozley created a modern lathe with a screw drive tool holder, and in 1800, the use of exchange gears, can be changed to feed the speed and the pitch of the processed threads. 1817, another Englishman Roberts used a four-stage pulley and back wheel mechanism to change the spindle speed. In order to improve the degree of mechanization and automation, in 1845, the United States of America's Fitch invented the turret lathe. 1848, the United States and the emergence of the back wheel lathe in 1873, the United States of America's Spencer made a single-axis automatic lathe, and soon he made a three-axis automatic lathe.
Types of lathes
Ordinary lathes
Wide range of processing objects, spindle speed and feed adjustment range, can process the internal and external surfaces of the workpiece, end face and internal and external threads. This kind of lathe is mainly operated manually by workers, with low productivity, and is suitable for single piece, small batch production and repair workshop.
Turret and rotary lathe
The turret tool holder or rotary tool holder which can hold many tools can be used by workers to complete many processes in one clamping of the workpiece by using different tools in turn, which is suitable for batch production.
Automatic lathe
Automatically completes the multi-process machining of small and medium-sized workpieces according to a certain program, and can automatically load and unload, and repeat the processing of a batch of the same workpieces, which is suitable for mass and large-scale production.
Multi-cutter semi-automatic lathe
Single-axis, multi-axis, horizontal and vertical. The layout of single-axis horizontal lathe is similar to that of ordinary lathe, but two sets of tool holders are installed in the front and back or up and down of the main spindle, which is used for processing disk, ring and shaft workpieces, and its productivity is 3-5 times higher than that of ordinary lathe.
Imitation lathe
Can imitate the shape and size of the sample plate or sample, automatically complete the processing cycle of the workpiece (see the imitation machine tool), for the shape of the more complex workpieces of small batches and batches of production, productivity than ordinary lathes 10 to 15 times higher. There are multi-tool holder, multi-axis, chuck type, vertical and other types.
Vertical lathe
The spindle is perpendicular to the horizontal plane, the workpiece is clamped on the horizontal rotary table, and the tool holder moves on the crossbar or column. It is suitable for processing larger and heavier workpieces that are difficult to be mounted on ordinary lathes, and is divided into two categories: single-column and double-column.
Gear Shoveling Lathe
The tool holder periodically makes radial reciprocating motion while turning, which is used for shoveling the shaped tooth surface of milling cutter, hob, etc. It is usually equipped with sharpening attachment, which is made by separate machine. Often with a spade attachment, a small grinding wheel driven by a separate electric motor spades the flanks.
Specialized lathe
Lathe for processing specific surfaces of certain types of workpieces, such as crankshaft lathe, camshaft lathe, wheel lathe, axle lathe, roll lathe and ingot lathe.
Combined lathe
Mainly used for turning, but additional special parts and accessories can also be boring, milling, drilling, insertion, grinding and other processing, with a "multi-functional" features, suitable for engineering vehicles, ships or mobile repair station on the repair work.
Saddle lathe
Saddle lathe in the head box at the left end of the bed is sunken, can accommodate large diameter parts. The shape of the lathe is high at both ends and low in the center, resembling a saddle, so it is called a saddle lathe. Saddle lathe is suitable for processing radial size, axial size of small parts, suitable for turning the workpiece outer circle, bore, end face, groove and metric, imperial, modulus, by section threads, but also for drilling, boring, reaming and other processes, especially suitable for single-piece, batch production enterprises. Saddle lathe can process larger diameter workpiece in saddle groove. The guideway of the machine tool is hardened and precision ground, which is easy and reliable to operate. The lathe is characterized by high power, high speed, high rigidity, high precision and low noise.
Direction of development
The application of CNC technology has not only brought revolutionary changes to the traditional manufacturing industry, making the manufacturing industry a symbol of industrialization, and with the continuous development of CNC technology and the expansion of the field of application, it plays an increasingly important role in the development of the national economy and people's livelihood of a number of important industries (IT, automotive, light industry, medical care, etc.), as the equipment required by these industries Digitalization has been a major trend of modern development. The current CNC lathe presents the following development trend.