The money – available in Europe, Canada, the US, and South Africa – is a gift through the Gene Haas Foundation.

Haas Automation Europe has announced the availability of a $1 million (€745,000) scholarship fund for machining and manufacturing education created by Gene Haas, the company’s founder and CEO.

The company noted that the money was provided to continue the machine tool magnate’s mission of ensuring a continuous supply of highly qualified students for manufacturing-based jobs, especially in industries where precision machining is crucial.

The founder explained his motivation. “By reducing the financial burden for students, we expect them to better focus on high academic achievement. Our goal is to help increase the quality and retention of students in manufacturing training programs across Europe. This is especially important at a time when young people appear to be losing interest in manufacturing-based careers.”

Applications for the scholarships are available online and managed by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers Education Foundation. It said it expects to award up to 1,000 scholarships this year. Scholarships of €500 to €2,000 are available, depending on the cost of the program of study, Hass Automation explained.

Foundation CEO Bart Aslin said, “Applications are made by the school, to which funds are sent directly.” A scholarship committee will review applications as they are submitted to ensure the minimum eligibility requirements are met. All applicants meeting the requirements will be awarded a scholarship, as long as funding is available.

“As we work to dispel the myth that people with a Bachelor’s degree automatically make more money than those without, we recognize the importance of creating educational pathways that allow all students the chance to earn a good living,” Aslin added.

Schools can download the application form at smeef.org and e-mail it to haas@sme.org. The last day for applications is 1 November 2013, the company said.

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Iscar: introduced the Multi-Master family of rotating cutting tools with interchangeable solid-carbide heads in 2000. These tools now have a strong presence in the manufacturing industry and are widely accepted by metalworking specialists. To explain the line’s capabilities, Iscar has prepared an informative question-and-answer session.

The Multi-Master design features a solid-carbide head connected with the tool body (shank) via a specially shaped thread. The thread connection, being successfully produced directly on a solid-carbide part, changed preexisting views regarding such an approach and motivated other cutting-tool producers to create similar systems.

In Multi-Master, one shank can carry heads of various cutting shapes. This maximizes the family’s versatility and functionality, significantly decreases the need for specially tailored tools, and enables users to reduce tool inventory. A few combinations of Multi-Master heads and shanks produce a great variety of cutting tools that meet exacting performance requirements and ensure reductions in production and logistical costs. Unlike with regular solid tools, regrinding is unnecessary, and tungsten carbide consumption is lessened.

The following Q&A presents questions new Multi-Master users typically ask, with answers that make clear the technological advantages this tool family offers.

How is a head mounted into a shank? A head has two surfaces: a short taper and a rear noncutting face that determines the head location in a shank. The taper ensures high concentricity, and the face a face contact. The thread is intended for securing the head. Therefore the rear (tail) part of the head has two areas: tapered and threaded.

During mounting, the head is initially rotated by hand and then tightened by means of a key. The head has flats for applying a key.

What are the advantages of the face contact? First, the face contact considerably increases both the stiffness of an assembled tool and its ability to withstand impact loading. This factor allows for stable cutting, minimizes vibrations and reduces power consumption.

Second, the face contact ensures high repeatability of the head overhang with respect to the shank. As a result, no additional adjustment is necessary after a head is replaced. An operator can change the head without removing the shank from a machine tool spindle.

What is meant by the “initial gap”? When tightening a head, an operator first rotates the head by hand. The head stops rotating at some point, and a small gap remains between the contact faces of the head and the shank. This important “initial” gap measures several tenths of a millimetre, the exact value depending on the thread size. Further head tightening is possible only with the use of the key. Tightening of the head causes elastic deformation, in a radial direction, of the contact area of the shank section.

Why is behind the Multi-Master thread’s special profile? Multi-Master heads are produced from tungsten carbide, an extremely hard heat-resistant material that exhibits lowered impact strength against certain workpiece materials, as, for example, high-speed steel (HSS). One of the main problems to be solved in designing a threaded tungsten carbide part thus is to minimize stress concentrators.

Additionally, the Multi-Master thread connection is relatively small, with nominal thread diameters generally between 5 and 15 mm. These sizes, along with the need to meet strength requirements for operational loads, can limit the height of the thread profile.

Therefore, using the standard threads would be problematic. A special thread shape that will comply with specifications of the connection was clearly necessary, and that is why Iscar designed the special-profile thread, which is called the T-thread.

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According to Iscar, the invention of Helimill in the 1990’s – said to be the first indexable sintered carbide insert with a helical cutting edge – elevated the company’s reputation as a producer of milling tools. The helical cutting edge, produced by the intersection of a helical relief surface and a rake face with a complex shape, ensures positive and constant rake angles along the whole edge.

This provided practical benefits, the company noted: smooth cutting action, advantageous chip formation, lower cutting forces and power consumption, better tool life and more. As a result, the helical cutting edge significantly increased productivity and improved tool performance. Almost every indexable milling tool, especially cutters intended for machining 90° shoulders, relies on the helical cutting edge as a basic design principle, it noted.

Two edges good, three edges better

Today, Helimill milling cutters feature a broad spectrum of insert geometries and sizes. Such a variety is said to ensure success of the original cutters in practically all shoulder milling operations. They machine all types of engineering materials and the accuracy of machined surface and its roughness have been good enough. But the company said it has improved the technology with the Heliqmill 390 line – a further development of inserts with helical cutting edges.

The classical insert and its derivatives have two cutting edges. The new line offers a triangular insert with three cutting edges. Interestingly, the length of the cutting edge of an insert with three edges is the same as for an insert with two, the company explained, noting that the new inserts are available with 10 and 15 mm cutting edge lengths.

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The taper and end clamping faces of the head and the holder are both solid carbide while the threaded part is steel. Other tools with a carbide head and carbide clamping section are usually constructed with a part carbide section brazed to a steel shank, creating an inherent weakness at the joint versus a solid carbide shank, the company said. The exchangeable nature of the series offers chances to reduce inventory and changeovers.

The mills target titanium alloys and heat-resistant alloys such as Inconel, along with stainless steels, carbon and alloy steels and hardened steels. Each head type has irregular helix flutes for vibration control and the four-flute corner radius type can incorporate coolant through-holes. The series incorporates the EP7020 “Smart Miracle” coated carbide grade for improved wear resistance, the company said.

Heads are supplied in five different geometries:

Four-flute corner radius with through coolant – Ø10 - Ø25, with irregular helix for vibration control
Four-flute corner radius – Ø10 - Ø25, with irregular helix for vibration control
Six, 10 and 12 flute – Ø10 - Ø25 for finishing, with irregular helix for vibration control
Four-flute and six-flute ball nose – Ø10 - Ø25, both with irregular helix for vibration control

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