2020 REVIEW OF THE YEAR
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is trying to make itself “highly approachable”
and the reason the new facilities are being
built in these areas is more about the supply
chains, rather than the OEMs.
This issue also featured a comprehensive
eight-page preview of MACH 2020 and news
of the all-new Voumard 1000 system, that
Hardinge Grinding said was a “new standard
in ID grinding” and exceeds the most
demanding of today’s grinding requirements.
An opinion piece by Nigel Flowers, UK
managing director of injection mould machine
supplies Sumitomo (SHI) Demag also
featured. Flowers considered the rivalries and
tensions between plastic parts produced by
moulding and those via additive
manufacturing, concluding that “both have
their place, as they each have pros and
cons”.
In March ( www.is.gd/C1jqg6 ), our lead
story focused on a UK development in hot
forming of lightweight aluminium auto parts
and the ambition that the process’s owner
March 2020 Volume 178 Number 4294 MACHINERY www.machinery.co.uk
has to carve out a signi cant place in a global
market, driven by automotive OEM lightweighting
efforts.
Coventry-based Impression Technologies
Ltd (ITL) was set up in 2013 as the
exclusive commercialisation route for hot
form quench (HFQ) technology and believes
it is the only company producing hot-formed
aluminium parts, using the HFQ process, for
commercial automotive applications.
We also had a special report on Studer’s
regular annual event that was attended by
our editor Andrew Allcock. He reported that
the key messages from the company, were
less about new developments and more
about the success of recent product
launches and increased market penetration.
The cylindrical grinding machine
manufacturer also announced that in the
last nancial year, it had achieved the thirdbest
annual turnover in its history,
increasing its market share again and better
fortunes were driven by winning new
customers. Studer forecasted further growth
of its market share in the next nancial year.
Industry 4.0 and automation are rm
xtures in the editorial calendar of Machinery
and this will continue, as there is so much
happening in this sector and we had
exclusive news in March of three practical
Industry 4.0 developments, in machine tool
maintenance, automotive part grinding/
honing and rotor grinding and milling.
A good example of the practical use of
high technology such as AI-analysis of
images to a rather mundane task the article
explains, is one that Germany’s Karlsruhe
Institute of Technology has developed, via a
system for the fully automated monitoring of
ballscrew drives in machine tools.
The system combines a camera with light
source attached to the nut of the drive and AI
that evaluates the image data. As the ballnut
moves on the screw, it takes individual
pictures of each screw section, enabling the
analysis of the entire spindle surface.
PANDEMIC CHANGES LIFE
The April ( www.is.gd/cCsJCB ) issue of 2020
was printed and published just as society and
business was being shaken at the core due
to the Covid-19 pandemic. News was coming
in during March when we wrote the magazine
and the comment piece re ected just that,
explaining the urgent demand for the
manufacturing of medical ventilators and PPE
and how widespread the world was being
impacted by the virus.
Industry 4.0 was the basis of the main
lead feature, with news of an industry- rst
high precision shop- oor asset/workpiece
location tracking project that was a part of a
key data-driven business development effort
at Dyer Engineering.
The company has worked with the Digital
Catapult to install high precision asset
location tracking, one of two that have taken
part in the so-called ’Connected Factory’
initiative, backed by some £250,000 of
Innovate UK money and delivering an
ef ciency boost valued at a reported
£10,000 a month.
The issue also covered DMG Mori’s annual
Open House event in Bavaria, Germany, where
important product, service, manufacturing and
company developments were unveiled, but we
report it was clear that while new hardware
still retains its dominant physical presence,
there is an ever-increasing importance of
software, connectivity and data.
During the event, top level news from
www.machinery.co.uk March 2020
OVER A CENTURY OF MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY INSIGHT
www.machinery.co.uk | MachineryMagazine | @MachineryTweets | April 2020 PB
www.machinery.co.uk | MachineryMagazine | MachineryTweets April 2020
OVER A CENTURY OF MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY INSIGHT
DMG Mori
German Open
House news p16
Industry 4.0
Connecting
the dots p22
Guhring UK
Additive manufacturing
of custom tools p39
MACH 2020
More news about
what’ll be there to
be seen p14
Industry 4.0
Practical
applications p35
FORMING
INNOVATIONUK-PIONEERED ALUMINIUM SHEET HOT FORMING PROCESS IN BID FOR GLOBAL APPLICATION
001_MACH_MAR20.indd 1 25/02/2020 15:36
DMG Mori was details of four world
April 2020 Volume 178 Number 4295 MACHINERY www.machinery.co.uk
Laser blanking
Schuler tech
challenges
tradition p27
NOT LOST
IN SPACEINDOOR LOCATION TRACKING PROVIDES CRITICAL DATA
Assembly automation
AP Racing drives up
capacity & more p21
Micro-machining
Knowledge transfer
effort p31
001_MACH_APR20newideacovN.indd 1 26/03/2020 16:22
www.machinery.co.uk | MachineryMagazine | @MachineryTweets | January 2021 17
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