A Brief Overview of the Features of the Vertical Machining Center

What is a vertical machining center?

A vertical machining center refers to a machining center where the spindle axis is set perpendicular to the worktable. It is mainly suitable for processing complex parts such as plates, discs, molds, and small enclosures.

China CNC vertical machining center can complete milling, boring, drilling, thread tapping, and cutting thread operations. A vertical machining center has a minimum of three-axis and two-linkage, and can generally achieve three-axis and three-linkage. The height of the vertical machining center column is limited, and the processing range of box-type workpieces needs to be reduced, which is a disadvantage of the vertical machining center.

However, the workpiece clamping and positioning of a vertical machining center is convenient; the tool motion trajectory is easy to observe, and debugging programs, checking measurements, and discovering problems in a timely manner are easy to do, allowing for machine shutdown processing or modification. The cooling conditions are easy to establish, and the cutting fluid can reach the tool and the machining surface directly. The three coordinate axes coincide with the Cartesian coordinate system, which feels intuitive and consistent with the pattern view. The chips are easy to remove and drop, avoiding scratching the machined surface. Compared with the corresponding horizontal machining center, the structure is simpler, the footprint is smaller, and the price is lower.

The vertical machining center has the following main functional characteristics:

Automatic tool changing function

The structure of the vertical machining center is basically the same as that of a CNC milling machine, and the machining technology is basically similar. However, the biggest difference between the two is that the machining center is equipped with an automatic tool changing device and a tool magazine, while the CNC milling machine does not have this function. The vertical machining center with an automatic tool changing device and a tool magazine has an automatic tool changing function and can be replaced according to the tools used during processing. Generally, a vertical machining center can change tools to process different parts of the workpiece. Deed CNC offers different vertical machining center for custom solutions, we have VMC vertical machining center and CNC vertical turning lathe machine, and 5 axis CNC vertical machining center.

One-time workpiece clamping can process multiple processes

From the previous point, the vertical machining center has an automatic tool changing function. With this function, it can perform multiple processes in one clamping, such as boring, drilling, milling, tapping, and thread cutting.

Expandable axis function

Since a conventional three-axis machining center cannot meet the requirements of processing complex curved surface workpieces, such as impellers, blades, shafts, and propellers, the vertical machining center can expand the four-axis or five-axis function according to the customer's requirements. As mentioned above, a vertical machining center has expandable axis functions that can be extended to four-axis, five-axis, and multi-axis.

One-time workpiece clamping can process multiple machining surfaces

As mentioned above, the vertical machining center can expand its axis function. After expanding the axis function, it can clamp the workpiece once and process multiple machining surfaces to avoid the accuracy errors caused by multiple clamping and to save time for manual workpiece clamping.