Alpine Metal Tech GmbH

The ABV machine is developed for the automatic sprue point drilling of alloy wheels after the casting process. It’s a strong and reliable machine, setting the standard for flexibility and efficiency.
Compared to the punching process, drilling of the sprue gives a lot more flexibility regarding size and thickness of the wheel hub area. An advantage which becomes more and more important due to the continuously increasing wheel size and material thickness. Distortion and deformation caused from the punching process can be fully avoided with the drilling system. Tool diameters up to 60 mm can be used without any problems. Fast feed rate and drilling speed can be programmed in speed and length. Prior to the drilling machines, a design recognition system can be used to divide and sent the wheels to the drilling machine with the most suitable drilling tool (diameter). Different options can be added to the machine, i.e. mist cooling, exhaust connection and chip conveyor.

Your advantages:

• Less construction limits for hub area: No limitation of material thickness and sprue diameter brings advantage to casting speed and process efficiency
• Low material stress: The drilling process causes a much lower material stress to the hub area compared to punching. Also at bigger material thickness, no danger of deformation or cracks.
• Cost reduction through recycling: The used metal screen will be chipped completely, the metal parts can be separated with a magnetic conveyor and the remaining material can be recycled to 100 %.
• Cycle time reduction at machining area: The drilling diameter can be close to machining value, less cycle time is needed in the OP1 machining operation
• Flexible production: With a short changing time of the tool, the actual drilling diameter can be adjusted to the production need. By using more drilling machines, each machine uses a different tool diameter to be more flexible.

 
 

The RRH machine is used for fatigue and endurance testing of wheels by rolling the wheel on a drum under specific radial load conditions.
The radial fatigue test is one of the required legal tests for alloy wheels in most countries worldwide. The Makra RRH fatigue test machine is designed to cover all required specifications concerning this test method. The modular design concept enables a variable number of test units, with a maximum of 4 individual load stations per machine. Additionally, these 4 load stations can also be a combination of passenger and truck wheel test units. As special requirement, an adjustable skew can be added to the load units. The individual test units can apply independent radial loads to the wheel which makes it flexible for testing several wheel types at the same time. The actual forces is measured by load cells, force is applied and regulated by electrical servo motors and spindles. Options like cooling, temperature measurement, wheel brake, safety fences, ... can be selected according to a customer request. The vertical arrangement of the drum has big advantages in user handling during wheel change compared to conventional horizontal drums. As interface, Profibus or Profinet is available. All measurement results are available through Ethernet connection on the customer network.

Your advantages:

• Certified test machines: The Makra radial fatigue test machines are certified from all major German car manufacturers (i.e. BMW, Audi, Volkswagen, Porsche, …) and for many years in operation
• Modular machine conzept: The machine can be equipped with 1 to 4 individual load stations. The load stations can be used for passenger car wheels or for truck wheels
• Precise and massive steel drum: The massive steel drum has internal stiffing rips and is balanced in 2 levels for nmax=400 rpm with a balance quality of Q2.5. The bearing is done with high quality cone bearings
• User friendly wheel change: With the vertical arrangement of the drum, a very user friendly wheel change is a main advantage. Less force and manpower is needed to lift and mount the wheel in its testing position
• Safety equipment for the wheels: Different kinds of safety devices like distance control, bubble control, temperature control, limit value control, … can be added to the machine control system

Flexible robot cells for fully automatic mixed wheel production in best wheel quality.

Your advantages:

• Integration of all available CNC machines possible
• Flexible production, simultaneous machining of different wheel types and sizes without setup times
• Chucking for lathe and drilling in highest precision, flexible for up to 3-inch sizes
• Automatic orientation of the wheels for the drilling process with turning unit and camera system
• Production capacity of up to 960 wheels/day, depending on the machining times
• Cell layout with 1 or 2 lathe machines, drilling with or without changing table
• Improvement of wheel quality with flexible orientation due to measurement at the cell entrance with a NUMTEC MD300 machine
• Wheel type recognition with NUMTEC barcode system or with design recognition system
• Integration of a fully automatic MD420 centre bore measurement optionally, including automatic correction of OP1 lathe program
• Control of the cell with a PLC system including visualisation, full data storage of wheel information for flexible production, with interface to a plant control system