Co-Engineering

All companies say they are customer-orientated. Actions speak louder than words though, and in fact we are constantly investing in a global presence via the exclusive service of technical design and deformation simulation to develop new tailor-made tools. In a word: S-Tooling.

This means not only being able to create ever more complex products but also to identify - together with the customer - the best solutions to industrialise them in the most efficient way.

Not everyone is able to start out from scratch and design a brand new screw and bolt production factory. Our experts can support new customers even in the pre-sales phase of our machines, to define a company layout with all the screw production process steps from wire preparation to heading and rolling, through to quality control and logistics. 
Depending on the production target, our technical department designs a layout that includes all the means necessary to produce the requested fastener portfolio.

The best way to produce fasteners is to move the workpieces as little as possible. Our brands can supply combined machines or, when it's not possible to work with a single machine, we can design a solution with a production line made up of our headers, thread rollers and our secondary operations machines. In this case, additional machines or units - such as a centrifuge, heat treatment unit or welding machine - can be installed. Thanks to our Tecno Lift division, we can connect all the machines together to turn them into a single production cell, avoiding the need for warehouse stock or the transportation of the workpieces. From the wire to the final product, the production line takes care of everything.

For the most demanding customers wanting to develop new activities or new product lines, the S-Tooling department is the best answer to ensure a full service from piece design to the industrialised project.

The S-Tooling project includes:

• the development of the optimised forming sequence using Simufact Forming®.
• the 2D and 3D construction drawings of all the tools of the unit and of the individual components in the following formats: .PDF, .DXF, .STP. The construction drawings of the tools are complete with all the details (materials, heat treatments, coatings, roughness, interferences, tool assembly instructions, air and oil drains, etc.) so each tool kit component can be produced in total autonomy
• kinematic verification of the entire tool kit to exclude collisions during the header set-up phase
• a check of complete compatibility with the header in terms of energy and distribution of the forming forces
• the tool kit for safely assembling even the most complicated tools, along with the necessary clamping forces
• all the details to be able to set up the header in the shortest possible time (kick-out phases, transfer times, etc.)
• a summarised tool list to easily manage spare parts, check all the tools in contact with the billet, check all the adaptable pieces and the centring gauges.

Another important detail is that the 3D print of the forming sequence allows you to preview the real shape of the workpiece created, together with the force calculated in the FEM analysis (free flow shape, chamfers, radii, tool fills, etc.).
The availability of these elements allows workpiece production to begin immediately, in a cost-effective manner for the customer.

The service known as S-Tooling refers to the Ingramatic activity focused on the development and design of tools for producing screws and bolts with or without assembled washers. 
Depending on the shape of the unprocessed workpieces, it's sometimes necessary to design special tools to ensure a perfect feeding system and the optimum positioning of the pieces in the starter unit to reach the productivity and reliability targets. 
The technical department can design the following equipment:

• set of starter fingers
• special feeding rails to handle non-standard shapes (double threaded workpieces, ball pins, heavy heads, headless workpieces, etc.)
• set of washer assembly tools
• loading system in collaboration with Tecno Lift, to load the workpieces into the thread roller in the best way to guarantee the production speed.

The S-Tooling service refers to the HS ASPE activity focused on the development and design of tools for producing pre-formed parts with our tapping and combined machines or our CNC machines (such as the multi-spindle lathes) or the more specialised transfer machines dedicated to the mass production of a single product.
According to the shape of the bespoke headed workpieces, our engineers design the right tools for perfectly producing them. 
The technical department defines the set of tools consisting of:

• vibrating feeder units
• feeding rails and channels for the headed workpieces
• a series of positioning and locking tools
• a loading system (in collaboration with Tecno Lift) for feeding the headed workpieces into the vibration devices, and conveyors for unloading the finished pieces.