B & H Tool Works, Inc. is a large tool and die company specializing in the design, build, and repair of Class "A" Progressive Dies. The company is headquartered in Richmond, Kentucky and was established in 1978 by Sammy Hammons and Tommy Brown. A second facility is located in Mount Vernon, Kentucky.
At the Richmond facility, capabilities include CNC machining, Wire EDM, and 5-Axis laser cutting services. Equipment used includes two CNC Vertical Machining Centers, one Mazak Turning Center, four Wire EDM Centers, and one Prima 5-Axis Laser. Recently the company upgraded one of its older CNC mills to a Kitamura MyCenter-7X and added an Agiecut Classic Gold 3S Wire EDM Center. The Laser Department includes 2 100-Ton press brakes used to form and bend lasercut parts.
Besides tool and die, B & H Tool Works also runs production of metal stampings for several industries, the largest being automotive. The company serves as a Tier 2 supplier to several large automobile manufacturers for metal stampings and tooling.
B&H now has 5 wire EDM machines and a total of 15 stamping presses. Recent construction has also added an additional 20,000 square feet (1,900m2) of manufacturing and office space.
Electrical discharge machining (EDM), also known as spark machining, spark eroding, die sinking, wire burning or wire erosion, is a metal fabrication process whereby a desired shape is obtained by using electrical discharges (sparks). Material is removed from the work piece by a series of rapidly recurring current discharges between two electrodes, separated by a dielectric liquid and subject to an electric voltage. One of the electrodes is called the tool-electrode, or simply the tool or electrode, while the other is called the workpiece-electrode, or work piece. The process depends upon the tool and work piece not making physical contact.
Computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) also known as computer-aided modeling or computer-aided machining is the use of software to control machine tools in the manufacturing of work pieces. This is not the only definition for CAM, but it is the most common; CAM may also refer to the use of a computer to assist in all operations of a manufacturing plant, including planning, management, transportation and storage. Its primary purpose is to create a faster production process and components and tooling with more precise dimensions and material consistency, which in some cases, uses only the required amount of raw material, while simultaneously reducing energy consumption. CAM is now a system used in schools and lower educational purposes. CAM is a subsequent computer-aided process after computer-aided design (CAD) and sometimes computer-aided engineering (CAE), as the model generated in CAD and verified in CAE can be input into CAM software, which then controls the machine tool. CAM is used in many schools alongside computer-aided design (CAD) to create objects.
Mastercam is a suite of Computer-Aided Manufacturing (CAM) and CAD/CAM software applications. Founded in MA in 1983, CNC Software, LLC is one of the oldest developers of PC-based computer-aided design / computer-aided manufacturing (CAD/CAM) software. They are one of the first to introduce CAD/CAM software designed for both machinists and engineers. Mastercam, CNC Software's main product, started as a 2D CAM system with CAD tools that let machinists design virtual parts on a computer screen and also guided computer numerical controlled (CNC) machine tools in the manufacture of parts. Since then, Mastercam has grown into the most widely used CAD/CAM package in the world. CNC Software, LLC is now located in Tolland, Connecticut.
Metalworking is the process of shaping and reshaping metals to create useful objects, parts, assemblies, and large scale structures. As a term it covers a wide and diverse range of processes, skills, and tools for producing objects on every scale: from huge ships, buildings, and bridges down to precise engine parts and delicate jewelry.
Numerical control is the automated control of machining tools by means of a computer. A CNC machine processes a piece of material to meet specifications by following coded programmed instructions and without a manual operator directly controlling the machining operation.
Metal fabrication is the creation of metal structures by cutting, bending and assembling processes. It is a value-added process involving the creation of machines, parts, and structures from various raw materials.
Sheet metal is metal formed into thin, flat pieces, usually by an industrial process. Sheet metal is one of the fundamental forms used in metalworking, and it can be cut and bent into a variety of shapes.
Tebis is a CAD/CAM software provided by Tebis AG, with headquarters in Martinsried near Munich/Germany. Development locations: Martinsried and Norderstedt, Germany International locations: China, Spain, France, Italy, Portugal, Sweden, United Kingdom, USA
A metal lathe or metalworking lathe is a large class of lathes designed for precisely machining relatively hard materials. They were originally designed to machine metals; however, with the advent of plastics and other materials, and with their inherent versatility, they are used in a wide range of applications, and a broad range of materials. In machining jargon, where the larger context is already understood, they are usually simply called lathes, or else referred to by more-specific subtype names. These rigid machine tools remove material from a rotating workpiece via the movements of various cutting tools, such as tool bits and drill bits.
Haas Automation, Inc is an American machine tool builder headquartered in Oxnard, California. The company designs and manufactures lower cost machine tools and specialized accessory tooling, mostly computer numerically controlled (CNC) equipment, such as vertical machining centers and horizontal machining centers, lathes/turning centers, and rotary tables and indexers. Most of its products are manufactured at the company's main facility in Oxnard. The company is also involved in motorsports: it owns the Haas F1 Team and in NASCAR the Stewart-Haas Racing Team. Haas is one of the largest machine tool builders in the world by total unit volume.
A model maker is a professional craftsperson who creates a three-dimensional representation of a design or concept. Most products in use and in development today first take form as a model. This "model" may be an exacting duplicate (prototype) of the future design or a simple mock-up of the general shape or concept. Many prototype models are used for testing physical properties of the design, others for usability and marketing studies.
Vero Software is a company based in Cheltenham, England, that specialises in CAD CAM.
Digital modeling and fabrication is a design and production process that combines 3D modeling or computing-aided design (CAD) with additive and subtractive manufacturing. Additive manufacturing is also known as 3D printing, while subtractive manufacturing may also be referred to as machining, and many other technologies can be exploited to physically produce the designed objects.
Photochemical machining (PCM), also known as photochemical milling or photo etching, is a chemical milling process used to fabricate sheet metal components using a photoresist and etchants to corrosively machine away selected areas. This process emerged in the 1960s as an offshoot of the printed circuit board industry. Photo etching can produce highly complex parts with very fine detail accurately and economically.
STEP-NC is a machine tool control language that extends the ISO 10303 STEP standards with the machining model in ISO 14649, adding geometric dimension and tolerance data for inspection, and the STEP PDM model for integration into the wider enterprise. The combined result has been standardized as ISO 10303-238.
In manufacturing, threading is the process of creating a screw thread. More screw threads are produced each year than any other machine element. There are many methods of generating threads, including subtractive methods ; deformative or transformative methods ; additive methods ; or combinations thereof.
Multiaxis machining is a manufacturing process that involves tools that move in 4 or more directions and are used to manufacture parts out of metal or other materials by milling away excess material, by water jet cutting or by laser cutting. This type of machining was originally performed mechanically on large complex machines. These machines operated on 4, 5, 6, and even 12 axes which were controlled individually via levers that rested on cam plates. The cam plates offered the ability to control the tooling device, the table in which the part is secured, as well as rotating the tooling or part within the machine. Due to the machines size and complexity it took extensive amounts of time to set them up for production. Once computer numerically controlled machining was introduced it provided a faster, more efficient method for machining complex parts.
WorkNC is a Computer aided manufacturing (CAM) software developed by Sescoi for multi-axis machining.
A punching machine is a machine tool for punching and embossing flat sheet-materials to produce form-features needed as mechanical element and/or to extend static stability of a sheet section.
Milling is the process of machining using rotary cutters to remove material by advancing a cutter into a workpiece. This may be done by varying direction on one or several axes, cutter head speed, and pressure. Milling covers a wide variety of different operations and machines, on scales from small individual parts to large, heavy-duty gang milling operations. It is one of the most commonly used processes for machining custom parts to precise tolerances.
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