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Article: Looking at 30-tapers in a new light: the six 30-taper machine tools in one Northeastern shop are used for more than just drilling holes and performing secondary operations. The affordable, small-footprint equipment is also used to machine parts complete from titanium and other challenging materials.
- Article from:
- Modern Machine Shop
- Article date:
- October 1, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 Gardner Publications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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I enjoy visiting shops that use equipment in ways you wouldn't expect. Fairview Machine (www. fairviewmachine.us) is one of those shops.
The Topsfield, Massachusetts shop has a number of beefy three-, four- and five-axis Matsuura machining centers. It's not surprising to see that equipment aggressively milling titanium, stainless steel and other such pain-in-the-butt materials. Sprinkled throughout the shop, however, are six, smallish Fanuc RoboDrills that are completely machining select workpieces from some of those same alloys.
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Of course, these 30-taper machines aren't taking heavy cuts ...