Boston Centerless - Precision Matters Magazine Boston Centerless Precision Matters Fall 2019 | Page 15

AUTOMATED CHAMFER
AUTOMATED CHAMFER EXPRESS LANE
AVOIDS THE CARPAL TUNNEL
BY DAVID MERSEREAU
OVER THE years, bar end chamfering
has become a more frequent requirement
from our customers. We recently added
an automated chamfer line to address
the growing volume and to increase
efficiency. Our process prior to this
addition was labor intensive, whereby an
operator would use a basic disc grinder to
spin a few bars at a time to rough chamfer
the end, much like sharpening a pencil.
This process, although satisfactory,
caused problems as the number of jobs
grew and customers were looking for
more consistent results. By implementing
an automated process, we were able to
achieve better consistency and higher
throughput as well as reduce the risk
for operator injuries, such as developing
carpal tunnel syndrome.
Benefit #1: Consistency
Customers were starting to run into
problems with the chamfer end catching
or causing rotational vibration as the
machining technology improved and
finer and finer features became possible.
The tighter tolerance demands of CNC
Swiss machines drove the need for more
consistent machined chamfers to reduce
vibrations and improve grip and feed into
the collets.
Benefit #2: Throughput
As we started to receive more
high-volume orders with different
types of alloys, the manual process
became a bottleneck, causing delays in
production. The volumes meant putting
more operators on the manual process
which resulted in a lack of consistency,
contributing to acentric and inconsistent
depth of chamfer, particularly in smaller
diameters where it was already difficult
to maintain any kind of throughput rate.
Benefit #3: Employee Health
Third and most important was the
potential for carpal tunnel injuries and
cramping as operators would have to
spend more hours to process larger
volumes. When small volumes need to be
chamfered by hand, an operator might
spend a few minutes processing them with
the old manual system. But as the number
of jobs increased and minutes turned
into hours, these health issues became a
bigger risk to operators.
Depending on bar diameter and alloy
type, the new automated line capabilities
include:
• Improved production of 25–100
bars per hour
15
•
Diameters
from
.125”
to
approximately .750”
• Full diameter “machined quality
chamfer”
• Fully automated loading which sets
the end of the bar automatically
and produces a chamfer at 45–60
degrees
With the automated line, we are
producing more bars in less time with a
more consistent chamfer in an environment
that is much more comfortable for our
operators.
David Mersereau
David Mersereau is the Sr. Vice President/
General Manager at Boston Centerless. David
has over 38 years of experience in operations,
manufacturing, quality systems and control
processes, supply chain management, material
testing and validation, and Lean manufacturing.
Prior to working at Boston Centerless,
David held senior level positions at Altron
Inc., Sanmina Corporation, North American
Industries, and George Roberts Corporation.
David holds a BS in Biology/Chemistry
from Lowell Technological Institute and an
MBA from the University of New Hampshire
Whittemore School of Business.