In its robotic machining centres, many companies use fully harnessed energy chain systems from igus. This cuts out many process steps for the manufacturer, reducing assembly time from several weeks to just half a day. Another benefit receives is from a single source and delivered onsite fully-tested for reliability and safety. In very few industries our throughput times is as important as in the machine tool industry. Cutting out individual work steps means achieving considerable savings in process costs. In developing CNC equipment industry, precision and reliability are critical factors. Therefore, it was important to have a reliable means of energy supply from the switch cabinet to the moving parts, which include spindles and motors. At the same time, all the information regarding axis position and dynamics must be passed back to the control system without any interruption. All this happens at accelerations of up to 0.5 g and a maximum travel speed of up to 60 m/min.

Reliable complete solution from a single source
Many engineering company's engineers turned to igus, the motion plastics specialist as igus is the only provider to develop energy chains that are configurable and predictable online, as well as specially designed, highly flexible chainflex cables tested for two billion cycles per year in a 2,750-square-metre test laboratory. As a complete system from one source, these socalled 'readychains' are harnessed to customers' requirements and then delivered as ready-to-install products. The advantage in using igus energy chains is the amount of installation space needed can be reduced considerably. One reason for this is that all chainflex cables on the machine
have an oil-resistant PUR outer jacket. As additional protective hoses are superfluous because of this feature, the amount of space needed for the cables, and therefore the size of the chains, are reduced.

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