Venturing into rebuild & new machines - M.M. 2001

IMTS was started as a service operation, and much of its early work was with companies in the Lucas group. It was as a result of a request in 1983 to consider rebuilding a machine that this new line of work was started. The rebuilding side of the business grew rapidly, as did the number of staff, and when a three- machine rebuild contract came up in 1990, the company moved to new and larger premises, adding a second unit just three years later.

As a result of its rebuilding, IMTS moved into the design and manufacture of special-purpose machines, most of these being produced by adapting standard units. "Many machine tool manufacturers focus on building standard types in high volumes, and they are not interested in building specials," says Mr Thurston. "There are many parts which can not readily be made using standard grinding equipment, but we are able to adapt machines to provide the required levels of flexibility."
 He offers the example of a company producing the bell- shaped ferrite ring that forms the basis of the electron guns used in TV tubes. "The manufacturer had been using a standard machine fitted with a thin diamond wheel, which achieved the required form by working in conjunction with a template. We suggested using an internal grinder and producing the required bore shape by plunge-grinding with a diamond-plated wheel, to produce the part in just 36sec as compared with 8min. The ma- chine we used was a Jung internal grinder fitted with our own design of hydraulic creep- feed valve to control the plunge cycle."

Another of IMTS's specials was a machine for grinding spherical bearings used in the suspension of Formula One cars. The bearings feature five radii and two diameters that need to be ground in a single operation. As a standard machine was not available, IMTS adapted a CNC Tschudin cylindrical grinder by fitting a hydraulic radius dresser and developing software that provided for the critical blending of the radii and diameters.

"We were able to modify an existing machine in a short time scale. It is unlikely that a major machine tool manufacturer could have achieved the tight time scale required - or would have been interested in a one-off in the first place."