News & Updates
(ARTICLE) Blue Photon Introduction to the Japanese Manufacturing Industry
December 8th, 2023 by Blue PhotonFixturing Castings Made Simple Through Adhesive Workholding
March 28th, 2023 by Blue Photon| 4 MINUTE READ
Fixturing Castings Made Simple Through Adhesive Workholding
When a casting proved too malleable for traditional gripping, Thomas/Euclid Industries adopted — and succeeded with — Blue Photon adhesive workholding.
Soft material was not the EV strut housing’s only workholding challenge: The part barely fit the UMC 750’s travels. Potential fixtures needed to be low-profile enough to ensure the part continued to fit the machine. Images courtesy of Thomas/Euclid.
As metals go, aluminum is soft and quick to bend — factors which make it easy to work with for most machining applications but make workholding to tolerances of 0.0005 inch unfeasible with traditional grippers. The force required to perform workholding could send the part out of tolerance, requiring rework or scrap. For Thomas/Euclid Industries, this difficulty became the push it needed to experiment with alternative forms of workholding, utilizing Blue Photon’s adhesive grippers to perform contactless gripping on an EV strut housing made from an aluminum casting.
Maximizing Lights-on Profits
Thomas/Euclid is primarily an aerospace manufacturer — EV automotive parts are not the norm for the company. In this case, the job came about not long after the shop installed a Matsuura MX 330 five-axis machine. The new machine’s automation capacity enabled the shop to run many of the jobs previously on its five-axis Haas UMC 750 for longer periods, decreasing the time necessary to complete these jobs even as it left the UMC 750 idle. Ryan Merrill, chief operating officer at Thomas/Euclid, says the search for additional work to put on the shop’s UMC 750 led the company to a customer already committed to machining EV strut housings.
Blue Photon Workholding System Simplifies Part Loading
March 10th, 2023 by Blue Photon | 2 MINUTE READ
Appears in Print as: ‘Workholding System Simplifies Part Loading’
Blue Photon Workholding System Simplifies Part Loading
PMTS 2023: The workholding stabilizer puck simplifies how parts are loaded, reducing scrap, enabling faster feed rates and increasing spindle uptime.
Blue Photon has designed a system using workholding grippers and insert components for use with Big Daishowa and other stabilizer systems. The system holds the workpiece without drilling and tapping into the part or with the need to clamp the part.
The unit is easily adjustable when positioning to grip the part wherever needed to stabilize the workpiece. The unit enables the transfer of loads to the machine table and base. The stabilizer puck simplifies how parts are loaded, reducing scrap, enabling faster feed rates and increasing spindle uptime.
Adhesive Workholding Pallet System Designed for Complex Parts
April 22nd, 2022 by Blue PhotonPublished | 1 MINUTE READ
Adhesive Workholding Pallet System Designed for Complex Parts
Blue Photon’s Grip Pallets are designed for quick change and adhesive workholding of complex and hard-to-hold parts for EDM, grinding, inspection, laser and milling operations
Blue Photon has added five Grip Pallets and three new inserts for 52- and 96-mm quick-change receiver systems. The addition enables more applications using existing fixturing systems in machining centers. Blue Photon Grip Pallets are designed to simplify how parts are loaded, reduce scrap and increase spindle uptime.
Available in 150, 225 and 300 mm square pallets, the Grip Pallets are designed for quick change and adhesive workholding of complex and hard-to-hold parts for EDM, grinding, inspection, laser and milling operations. The pallets can hold parts securely, providing increased machining access on five to six surfaces while using standardized fixturing systems already in place.
(VIDEO) Swarf Talk: Blue Photon Video Clip
September 29th, 2021 by Blue PhotonLearn more about the world’s only ultraviolet workholding technology
June 29th, 2021 by Blue PhotonBlue Photon® will demonstrate the advantages of their ultraviolet (UV) workholding technology at the Ceramics Expo, Gosigerfest, Rapid+tct, Southtec and Wichita Industrial Trade Show this fall.
(VIDEO) Ultraviolet (UV) Workholding Technology for Additive Manufacturing
May 28th, 2020 by Blue PhotonHow do you hold additive parts for post-machining?
Blue Photon workholding products are designed to hold complexed-shaped, additive parts for tight-tolerance machining, and final finishing while creating better parts, and lowering manufacturing costs. To learn why we are the world’s solution to holding additive parts, check out the video below:
(VIDEO) Blue Photon Product Video
May 28th, 2020 by Blue PhotonBlue Photon is ecstatic to announce the following release of their new product video with examples demonstrating the Blue Photon technology and workholding system.
For a more in-depth visual of how Blue Photon’s ultraviolet (UV) workholding technology is a solution to your workholding needs, check out the video below:
Workholding for High Accuracy Medical Device Machining
May 20th, 2020 by Blue PhotonPost Processing | 3D printing presents challenges in workholding for finish machining
Mark Kirby
AM Business Manager,
Renishaw Canada
Metal 3D printing can enable rapid, low cost iterations of new medical devices, since no tooling costs are involved. All devices need testing to uncover problems and develop solutions—allowing the product shape to change “for free” is a powerful advantage with Additive Manufacturing (AM). Other benefits flowing from AM besides enabling more complex geometry are improved accuracy with no component tolerance stack up, and a simplified supply chain with reduced part count. Read the rest of this entry »
Turning to an Adhesive for Lathe Workholding
May 19th, 2020 by Blue Photon5/19/2020 | 4 Minute Read
Turning to an Adhesive for Lathe Workholding
“Adhesive cured by ultraviolet light is an option for securing parts for machining that could otherwise distort when traditional, mechanical clamping techniques are used.”
Check out the article from Production Machining Blog to learn how BlueGrip workholding adhesive could be a solution to your turning applications:
Turning to an Adhesive for Lathe Workholding
Thin rings such as this one are candidates for a photo-activated adhesive workholding process. The process eliminates part distortion that can might happen when conventional, mechanical clamping devices are used.
For some turning applications, chuck jaws or other conventional workholding devices for CNC lathes can cause a part to distort as clamping force is applied. This can be the case for large, thin rings such as the one shown on the left. Those workholding elements can also prevent full access to a part, which might necessitate reclamping for an additional operation.
Blue Photon offers an alternate workholding method for these types of situations that uses adhesive cured by ultraviolet (UV) light to secure a part for turning. It can also be used for other processes such as milling, grinding, electrical discharge machining and 3D printing/additive manufacturing.