EXHIBITION PREVIEW METAV, DÜSSELDORF, 10 TO 13 MARCH – WWW.METAV.COM
Fortieth
anniversary event
METAV opened its doors for the fi rst time in March 1980, so this year’s edition in Düsseldorf, from
10 to 13 March, is the event’s 40th anniversary. Metalworking technologies will again this time be
supplemented by the areas of: Additive Manufacturing; Medical; Moulding; and Quality. New, on the other
hand, is the hall allocation. Located directly between the North and South entrances, the brand-new Halls
1, 4 and 5 make METAV easier to reach by underground
When the event started, there
would have been no mention and
no conception at large of
something called 3D printing. But since
2014, there has been an additive
manufacturing (AM) element. Even at the
METAV 2016, the organiser reports that
one-third of the visitors claimed that they
were using AM processes or speci cally
working on them. In 2018, METAV upped its
AM game by staging a leading B2B
conference and this year an expert forum in
Hall 1 will round off the content, with a
programme to follow shortly.
An intriguing application of the
technology has been in support of
metalcutting itself, with the use of the
technology increasingly employed in the
manufacture of cutting tools/toolholders,
above all because of the exibility offered to
coolant feed and delivery. This trend is one
of those noted by METAV’s organiser
(Germany’s machine tool industry
representative body, VDW), which quotes
Dr Matthias Luik, head of research &
development at Paul Horn GmbH, who says:
“Here, turning processes involving a coolant
attachment or with narrow tools are
deployed in cases where conventional
internal cooling cannot be used.” The latest
product with a 3D-printed component from
the Tübingen-based tool specialist is the
company’s CL distributor disc (above) for a
reaming tool. Indeed, Horn has actually
published a separate catalogue (https://
is.gd/rataze) covering coolant distribution
discs realised via AM.
METAV exhibitor Iscar has been providing
additively manufactured tools for many
years. Of recent developments, Erich
Timons, CTO and member of the executive
board of Iscar Germany GmbH, says: “Our
new product campaign features a number of
tools that have never been available on the
market before. These include tools with very
small diameters. When insert-based tools
with internal coolant channels have to be
produced, conventional methods quickly
reach the limits of what is feasible.”
Part of AM’s application in toolholder
manufacture is due to the available
materials. For example, high carbon steel
exhibits cracking, due to the rapid cooling
and solidi cation rates. It is easier to
process austenitic and martensitic steel
types, the very materials used, for example,
in the manufacture of toolholders with an
intelligent cooling lubricant supply.
And Iscar’s Timons ampli es the
importance of materials. “The focus in the
future will be on using new additive
materials. This includes the additive
production of hard metals and hybrid
materials. There is enormous potential right
now, as it is possible to combine completely
different material properties.”
Not making use of the technology but
rather supporting the integration of printing,
post-processing and machining processes is
exampled by the availability of workholding
systems that suits both, as exhibitor AMF
Andreas Maier GmbH & Co KG’s managing
director explains: “Series production and a
holistic approach to the process are playing
a key role. Here, we started to communicate
openly from an early stage in order to
optimise and standardise the various
process steps in terms of clamping
technology. Our zero-point clamping system
offers the best uniform interface for both
the printing process and the complete postprocessing
stage.
Clearly, while ‘traditional’ exhibition
content will still be the core of METAV, there
is no doubt that AM is insinuating itself ever
more deeply within the production sphere.
As the exhibition organiser says: “Scarcely
any other manufacturing technology has
undergone such rapid development in the
past ve years as AM.”
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