CNC Rapid Aluminum Prototyping Company Design Support High Precision Good Quality Fast Delivery
Customer was an Australia company offering professional service and engineered solutions for fluid systems. This prototype was made to test liquid pressure and fitting before low volume production. Since big dimensions, shape stability and milling tolerance were key points.
CNC Precision Milling is a type of conventional manufacturing technology that uses the high-speed rotating cutting tool to precisely remove the unwanted material from a solid workpiece. The cutting tool is usually held in a spindle and moving along multiple axes (3,4,5 axes) to create various structures, shapes and features. Here are some key features and advantages of CNC milling:
High Precision: CNC milling are capable of producing highly precise and accurate parts with tight tolerances, often within 0.01 to 0.1 mm, or more tighter one. This makes CNC milling ideal for applications that require high precision and accuracy, such as defense, aerospace, medical devices, and automotive, etc.
High Efficiency: CNC milling can manufacture parts accurately and quickly, which saves the time and cost of production. It can also produce complex parts in a single setup, that eliminates the need for multiple machines and many setups.
Great Customization: CNC milling machines can be programmed to produce highly custom parts for exact details and specifications, which brings the great design flexibility and customization. This is especially important for the industries that require unique or specialized parts.
CNC machining usually started from coarse milling by big cutting tools to fast remove unwanted material, to fine milling by gradually smaller tools. For 3 axis CNC milling, workpiece was rotated manually and repositioned accurately to mill the part side by side, tolerance around ± 0.1mm.
One of the fast growing and wide applications of CNC machining today is Rapid Prototyping for its advantages of cheap and target materials, tight tolerance as well as usually cheap production cost, thus CNC milled prototypes deliver more reliable and economical feedback on mechanism and strength verification.
Fixtures and Jigs were usually applied to assit milling for high efficiency and tolerance. One deep hole was bored as it was out of milling capability. The CNC Machined Prototype prior to Surface Finishing. All cutting lines and burrs on milled surface were removed by sanding and beadblasting. Generally, 6061/6063 and 5052 were the common and preferred series of aluminum material to get the quality anodizing finishing.
Compared with Additive Manufacturing (AM) technologies for Rapid Prototyping & Manufacturing, CNC Machining is a great choice for Rapid Prototypes manufacturing for its real and cheap raw materials, high precision, wide material and surface finishing options, usually economical manufacturing cost, and fast turnaround. Here are part of the benefits of CNC machined prototypes:
Real and Cheap Raw Materials. Compared with Additive Manufacturing (AM) technologies using expensive liquid or powdered materials with simulated properties, CNC machining uses the real and cheap solid materials to build the prototypes, so CNC machined prototypes work great for strength, flexibility and durability verification for product development.
High Precision. Additive Manufacturing (AM) technologies, such as 3D Printing, provide manufacturing tolerance usually ± 0.1 mm or worse, CNC machining can provide tolerance up to ± 0.001 mm that is much tighter than AM technologies, so CNC machined prototypes provide more reliable and precise feedback on fitting and mechanism test.
Economical Production Cost. Material takes the majority of AM prototypes manufacturing cost, and AM technology simulated materials cost much much more than its relatively raw materials used by CNC machining, such as CNC ABS material costs round 3 USD per kilogram, and AM simulated ABS one costs round 500 USD per kilogram and even more some years ago, it is around 136 times higher than CNC one. So more material involved for the prototypes, more competitive price the CNC machining delivers.
Fast Turnaround. Manufacturing complex geometry and details is the key advantage for AM technologies over CNC machining, and for the parts with simple geometry and details, CNC machining could take shorter time than AM technologies to finish the prototypes, especially for the low volume prototypes manufacturing.
How does HONKIA compare to other suppliers on price?
Compared to other Chinese suppliers, we choose not to compete on price but to offer the high level of quality, rapid response, and professional results. That’s why some customers cooperate with us for many years, compared with the price, they need a reliable partner to avoid serious losses caused by annoying after-sales service or even the trouble of finding no one.
What if I am not completely satisfied with the parts I receive?
HONKIA will free remake or amend the returned parts that you are not completely satisfied, or refund the full arrived payment, though this is rarely happened in the past. Any disputes based on a subjective or unilateral determination shall be discussed and negotiated to reach a reasonable result. Our continuing business relies on earning your confidence in our ability to meet and exceed the reasonable expectations.
