THE PRECISION REQUIREMENTS MADE ON TOOLS RISE ALMOST ON A DAILY BASIS

THE NEED IS FOR EVEN HIGHER TOOL SERVICE SERVICE LIVES; EVEN HIGHER PRECISION AND EVEN BETTER SURFACE QUALITIES.

However, one thing is also clear: more exotic tools are being called for. Two experts, ZECHA Hartmetall-Werkzeugfabrikation GmbH and the machine manufacturer KERN Microtechnik GmbH, have come together to breathe life into their passion for maximum precision:

How do we define precision and how far can it be taken? The proof – a logo milled into a human hair – provides the final answer: very far indeed!

The fascination is great. Difficult to imagine that a hair can be lettered using a mill cutter. Everybody knows how fine hair is, so how microscopically small must the mill cutter be to achieve the feat? Yet, ZECHA and KERN have turned the unimaginable into reality and lettered a human hair with a diameter of 90 µm using a dual blade ZECHA mill cutter. As a specialist in micro machining, stamping and shaping tools, ZECHA has produced and developed high quality and precision tool solutions for a vast range of sectors and applications for almost 60 years. 

The specially developed carbide shaft mill cutter employed has two cutting edges and with a diameter of a mere 10 µm work extremely finely and precisely.

The tool and machine combination, here the KERN Micro HD, operating at a spindle speed of up to 50,000 rpm and a feed rate per tooth of 1 µm, achieve the unbelievable lettering width of 10.73 µm. Results that can only be appreciated under a scanning electron microscope.

Even if the lettering of a human hair does not turn out to be a requirement in the future, it does show us the dimensions of precision that can be achieved in micro machining. The high quality and accuracy in each individual application can only be achieved by the ideal combination of tool, machine and use