Glass Grinding
Precise force control and Soft-Land™ capability for a glass and ceramics manufacturer. SMAC high precision actuators improve the glass grinding methods.
Application 1:
Product used: LAL55 series linear
Objective: Since glass is extremely brittle material, grinding processes requires precise force control and high accuracy. The grinding process itself produces a 125µm finish with less than a 50µm variation in the finish. The customer was having a difficulty with adjusting force for the grinding wheel which was driven by pneumatic cylinders. This could easily damage the material at each end of the cycle. The challenge was to provide a constant force of 2 to 4N with a 5mm stroke during the whole process.
Solution: LAL55 series linear actuators move the grinding wheel with the appropriate force. The SMAC LAC-1 single axis controller monitored the data and sent immediate feedback. Thus, the force is precisely controlled at all times. The production cycle became more reliable and no material was damaged anymore, increasing efficiency and performance.
Application 2:
Product used: LAL20 series linear
Objective: The customer needed to measure the thickness of very thin glass material. They had been using pneumatic cylinder, LVDT and a force control system which didn’t bring the expected results. They were looking into electric options to improve their measurement procedure with more control and flexibility.
Solution: SMAC provided a LAL20 series linear actuator to control force precisely and use the Soft-Land™ procedure to gently touch the glass surface. An additional load cell was mounted on the shaft in order to increase the accuracy of the force measurement during the process. The data of the LAL20 and the load cell was monitored by LAC-25, a dual-axis controller, providing constant feedback of the measurement. The SMAC actuator cooperated with load cell replaced three devices. This not only simplified the system but also provided accurate operation, data capture and feedback, and resulted in efficient performance.