Like other machining operations, sawing operations and sawing machines are also very important in manufacturing industries. There are various types of sawing operations that we use. Also, there are various purposes that we use these operations. You can find detail information about this topic here. These topics are;
Table of Contents ;
- What is sawing operation?
- What are the types of sawing machines?
- What are the applications of them?
- Advantages and disadvantages of them.
- FAQs
What is a Sawing Machine and What is Sawing Operation?
Actually, we are talking about the industrial sawing operations. In industrial level, sawing operations are very important just like turning, drilling, milling, planing and broaching. In sawing machines, there is a cutting tool that has multiple cutting edges arranged in a row.
Also, we use the sawing operations in the cutting large materiak stocks into half. Or we use sawing machines to cut the unwanted sections of the workpieces. So, we can think that sawing machines are the primary operations before the main shaping and machining operations. This is a step to prepare the workpiece.
In sawing machines, the cutting tool performs the primary motion. Also the workpart is stationary. So, there is no feed motion in sawing machines. In general, there are three types of sawing operations.
What are the Types of Sawing Machines?
There are different types of sawing machines. They differ according to their working principles. Also, the purpose of the uses of these machines make these differences.
Hacksaw Machines
This is the first type pf sawing operations. In this operation, the cutting tool perform cutting operation only in one direction. And also the cutting tool involves only one row of cutting edges. Because of this, hacksaw machines are the least efficient ones around other sawing machines.
Furthermore, we can operate hacksaw machines manually or automatically. We call the automatic hacksaw machines as power hacksaw. In these machines, we can adjust the power of the cuttting, pressure of the cutting and speed of the cutting.
In general, we use this type of machines in the cutting operations of unwanted sections of workparts. Also we call the cutting unwanted sections as cutoff operations.
Bandsaw Machines
This is the second type of sawing operations. In bandsaw machines, there is a pulley-like cutting tools which rotates as infinite loop. This infinite rotation gives the infinite loop motion of the cutting operation. So, the cutting motion takes place in one direction without any interruption.
There are two configurations of bandsaw machines; vertical and horizontal.
Vertical Bandsaw Operations
Vertical and horizontal bandasaw operations are generally depend on the orientation of the badsaw cutting tool. If the orientation is vertical, we call them vertical bandsaws. The vertical orientation is the most classical one. Also we use veritcal bandsaw operations in the slotting and contoruing of workparts.
We need to obtain a feed motion to obtain slots and contours on workparts with bandsaw operations. We can perform this feed motion manually and automatically.
Horizontal Bandsaw Operations
So, if the orientation of the bandsaw is horizontal, we call them horizontal bandsaw machines. Unlike the vertical bandsaw machines, we can not obtain contouring and slotting operations.
Also, CNC technologies are began to apply these bandsaw machines. Because, there are lots of kinds of applications to perform contouring and slotting operations on bandsaw.
Circular Sawing Operations
This is the third type of sawing operations. In circular sawing operations, the cutting motion is made by a circular cutting tool. There are edges that aligned on a circular workpart. In general, we use the circular sawing in the cutting operations long bars and tubes into sections.
Circular cutting tool is very similar with the slot milling machines. But circular cutting tools have much more cutting edges.
In circular sawing, a spindle rotates the workpart to obtain primary motion. And feed motion is provided by the machine to cut the workpart. Workpart is generally stationary.
There are othe 2 variations of circular cutting operations; abrasive cutoff and friction cutting.
Abrasive Cutoff Machines
This is an also circular cutting operation where the circular cutter is replaced by a abrasive cutting tool. We use abrasive cutting operations for the materials that very hard to cut with the conventional cutters.
Friction Cutting Machines
In the friction cutting machines, the cutting tool is a circular and made from a very hard material. Also rotation speeds are very high for friction cutting machines. Once the rotating blade touches to the workpiece, a friction force takes place. This friction creates a regional melting and cutting takes place abruptly.
In general abrasice cutoff and friction cutting machines more rapid in the cutting operations than conventional ones.
Applications of Sawing Operations
We use these different types of sawing machines in different operations like below.
- In carpentry, sawing operations and sawing machines are very common. Also in the industrial level carpentery, there are lots of kinds of sawing machines are in the use. So, maybe the carpentery and the woodwork is one of the biggest application area of sawing machines.
- Also, we are using sawing machines in the cutting of big metal workpieces. For example, you are purchasing big metal workpieces and they produce minimal parts from them. Firstly, you need to cut these workpieces into machinable sizes with sawing machines. This application is also called as stock cutting operations.
- In addition to that, grooving and slotting on parts are the very important application of bandsaw operations. We stated it above. We can obtain variıus kinds of slots and grooves on workpieces especially with the vertical bandsaw machines.
- In the tube and long-stock production, we use lots of sawing operations also. Tubes and long bars comes into the manufacturing site. First of all, we need to divide these long workpieces into short ones to machine them to obtain products. We are doing this with circular sawing machines in general.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Sawing Operations
Juts like other machining operations, there are advantages and disadvantages of sawing operations.
Advantages
- One of the most important advantage is, decrease the total work of the main machinining operations. For example, they cut large workpieces to small workpieces. So, in the milling operations, we are not need to make raw machining to remove excess material.
- In general, the tooling is low cost. Maybe this is the most important advantage. You are making a very high intensity job with sawing machines. But, the total costs are low.
- Maintenance costs are relatively low. If we compare with complex machining centers, the maintenance costs are low.
- Also, no high-skilled workforce is required for sawing operations. Because, sawing operations are very simple. This provides low-cost workforce for the company.
Disadvantages
- The main disadvamtge of the sawing operations is material handling. In general, we are working with very big materials and handling these workpart can be a problematic issue. This adds an additional cost to operation of these machines.
- Sawing operations are generally raw cutting operations. So, the energy consumption of these machines quite high if we compare with other kinds of machines.
Conclusion
So, sawing operations are very important for the machining industries. There are various types of sawing operations available. You can select one of them according to your requirements. So, it is very important to know about the general advantages and disadvantages of these machines.
If you take a look at the applications, actually applications are same. But the workpieces can change. Selecting a proper machine for proper workpiece is very important.
Always you need to consider the advantages and disadvantages of these machines.
So, do not forget to leave your comments and questions below about the sawing machines.
Your precious feedbacks are very important to us.
FAQs
We use the industrial sawing operations are machines for cutting the workpieces into smaller parts. We use different kinds of these operations cutting different workpieces.
The working principle of sawing machines is very simple. There is an electric motor that give the motion to spindle mechanism which holds the cutting tool. Also, there is a controlled gear mechanism that adjusts the speed of the cutting tool.
Because, they provide many profit for a machining industry. The workpieces are generally very big to machine. To machine these workpieces, we need to cut them into smaller ones. So, by not making it in the conventional machines, they will have a profit from that.
There are 3 types of sawing operations. They are; hacksaw, bandsaw and circular sawing operations. According the material and part type, they select a proper type of sawing machine.
The primary purpose is the cutting big workpieces that comes in raw form into smaller ones. So, we can obtain proper sizes of workpieces to machine in primary machines.
You can check the related contents about manufacturing and machining below;
What is the Net-Shape or Near Net-Shape Manufacturing?
Definitions of Accuracy, Precision in Manufacturing
The Logic of Lean Production in Manufacturing
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