TOOL AND SPINDLE MONITORING

The project consists of the implementation of two control devices within a work center with the aim of preventing damage to the machine and the machined piece. The devices were installed in collaboration with the company COMAU S.p.a, which develops and designs numerical control machines used mainly by companies in the automotive sector, more precisely the work was carried out on a standard SMARTDRIVECOMAU 700L (SD700L) machine. Machining centers are machines that allow various mechanical processes such as roughing, boring, milling, threading and drilling on a single piece, exploiting the possibility of automatic tool change during a work cycle. During the manufacturing processes, elements such as the spindle and tools wear out and their non-replacement could cause low quality of the finished product and in the worst case could cause damage to the machine, however it is possible to prevent these consequences by installing some devices. The DIGITAL WAY company designs control systems such as WATTPILOTE which allows to monitor the state of wear and breakage of the tool, and such as SAFEPILOTE which allows to reduce damage from involuntary crashes, detects chips in the spindle and analyzes rotational stability of the same. To carry out the complete installation of these components it was necessary to mechanically and electronically design the implementation of a sensor located on the back of the spindle. The electrical circuit of the work center was modified, and new parts of the PLC code and part program were written to allow correct data acquisition and processing.