Circular saw trades milling for sawing: like a baseball general manager, TURN-ACT's bob Fowler has made a trade. Unlike many sports executives though, this exchange has definitely benefited his team. (Sawing).

Using a new circular saw, Fowler has been able to trade mill time for saw time. "Trading mill time for saw time is a wonderful thing," Fowler maintains. "It has absolutely saved us time and it has absolutely made us money." The saw Fowler installed is a Kaltenbach RKL 550 AX.

TURN-ACT (Louisville, KY) is a leader in the design and manufacturing of innovative automation products. One of its main products is a pneumatic actuator that comes both in linear and rotary forms. The company's customer base includes virtually every type of manufacturer, user and OEM.

The call to Kaltenbach was made as TURN-ACT prepared to introduce a new line of National Fluid Power Association cylinder products. "In order to get into this market," Fowler said, "we needed to improve productivity; we needed to have superior finishes; we needed repeatability, and we needed accuracy. The Kaltenbach saw was exactly what we needed."

The clincher was when four TURN-ACT employees traveled to Kaltenbach's North American headquarters in Columbus, IN. They came armed with a variety of parts to be test cut by the RKL 550 AX. Fowler said the mission was clear from TURN-ACT's perspective. "Show us that it will work, show us that it's consistent, show us that it's repeatable - and they did."

The Kaltenbach saw enjoys a level of sophistication unique among aluminum circular saws. First, it has a 6" capacity, which is big for an aluminum circular saw, according to the manufacturer. Second, it incorporates blade separation. That is, the blade is separated from the cut part and the stock material before the return stroke, to ensure that the cut surfaces are not marked. This is very important in the cutting of aluminum, a material that is soft and marks easily. And because some materials are welded or machined in the manufacturing process, aluminum is often on full display. Aesthetics are therefore a consideration.

"The idea is to provide a cut surface straight from the saw that is good enough," says Dave McCorry, Kaltenbach's executive vice president. "That's unusual, because if it is something that you're going to see, normally it has to be machined. Aluminum is a material, that, depending on the application, we can cut to finished surface finish and finished length. That means there is a component coming off the saw, rather than a piece that needs further work."

"It's the best saw finish that we've ever had," agrees Fowler. "I can still mill it and do all kinds of things to get better finishes but I now can produce an acceptable finish with a cold saw on aluminum parts. With my old cold saw, I had no choice but to put it in a lathe a mill to face it."

The circular saw is also fitted with a 'floating' feed gripper: a special feed gripper that adjusts to the variances of the material. For instance, if the material isn't perfectly straight, the 'floating' feed gripper will make allowances, so that the tolerances on finished components are closer.

The productivity gains that TURN-ACT has realized from using the RKL 550 AX have been impressive. With this saw, Fowler says that it now takes a half-day to achieve what it used to take a week with the old saw. "The saw doesn't run all of the time but it doesn't need to run all of the time," Fowler says. "I have something else that I can have this employee do."

Fowler and his team were so impressed by their visit to Kaltenbach and the demonstration that in addition to the circular saw they also purchased a KB 360 AG band saw. "The band saw that we had was old," Fowler explains. "It had been reliable for us and we didn't let it go easily, but the new saw that we got also took care of some problems from a repeatability standpoint. And, we were able to alleviate some damage issues that we had with shafting and other larger parts." Kaltenbach, Inc.

www.rsleads.com/301mn-206

or Circle 206 for more information