New Sights at Absolute

Absolute Machine Tools opened the doors of its 40,000-square-foot Technical Center in Mason, Ohio, on October 2 for an Oktoberfest-themed open house. Guests enjoyed German foods, beer, music and displays of Absolute’s varied equipment offerings, including new machines from Precihole Machine Tools and Nexturn. Precihole, a builder of deep-hole and drilling machines headquartered in Mumbai, India, and Nexturn, a South Korean manufacturer of CNC Swiss-type turning machines, are the first non-Taiwanese machine tool brands to be imported by Absolute.

More equipment lines enable Absolute to offer its customers a wider range of machinery, but the company also adds products with an eye toward integration. The supplier is increasingly focused not only on providing individual machine tools, but also on helping customers create complete machining systems as interest in automated cells, turnkey systems and other grouped offerings grows.

According to Absolute President Steve Ortner, consumer interest in automation, in particular, has translated into a higher demand for automated load/unload systems, cell configurations and lights-out capabilities. To help meet these requirements, Absolute achieved Authorized Integrator status with FANUC Robotics America earlier this year. This relationship allows Absolute to equip its machine tool offerings with robots, infrared vision systems and other technologies.

An automated cell display (pictured above) featuring a variety of Absolute’s offerings illustrated these integration capabilities. In this system, a FANUC M20iA/20M robot is set up to tend a Tongtai TMV-510G machining center (back left) as it cuts graphite blanks. The robot could then move the completed blanks to the Accutex DS-550CM die-sinker EDM (right) for use in a deep-rib burning operation. Visit Absolute’s website for more on these machines and the supplier’s other offerings.