tion is to pay off for Edscha, a level of flexi- bility to match. This is why the Remscheid production and process planners, in collaboration with a special-purpose machinery maker, devoted as much love of detail to the development of the new machining equipment as the hinge designers did to the hinge.

UNTIRING OPERATION

Featuring pallet systems, short tooling times and flexibly usable machining stations, this is the most complex modular CNC machine (out of many others) ever to be ordered by the Edscha Group – and the biggest to boot. Its sheer size – 27 meters long, eight meters wide and four meters high – called for delicate maneuvering when it was delivered in June: with the aid of huge cranes and com- pressors, the colossus was bedded on an air cushion, about one millimeter thick, in front of the Hauzenberg production hall, and then floated on that cushion with great precision to its destination. Eight employees of the machinery making company then spent about five weeks setting up and testing the highly sensitive equipment.

Large-scale operation of the facility isscheduled to begin in October: in 18 machi-

ning steps and across 28 CNC axes, it will simultaneously machine raw forgings, two for the left, two for the right (provided only with punched screw holes), into Notch Stop pillar or door parts. Every single step on these very latest carbide cutting tools – starting with milling, continuing with drilling, coun- tersinking, reaming, and ending with thread cutting and deburring – takes only eleven seconds, including transport and adjustment; one part therefore takes about three-and-a- half minutes to pass through all stations. Then the finish-machined parts have to be galvan- ized, paired with their counterparts and assembled on two equally modern and newly acquired assembly lines – four Notch Stop hinges are then complete.

The young generation is growing quickly: in Hauzenberg it will soon be possible to machine eight parts simultaneously. In order to cover the highest capacities for all vehicle series already on order, another identical machine has already been ordered. Properly treated and maintained, both have a life expectancy of over ten years. But the next- but-one hinge generation is sure to be on the horizon by then.

Rafael Zelek

COLOSSUS ON CUSHION

Delivery and assembly of the new metal-cutting system required the greatest care to ensure that roads, bridges, buildings and the machine itself were not damaged.

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