Upgrading Older or Legacy Machine Shop Lathes & Machining Centres
EEC Ltd are engineer’s specialist in Digital Readout (DRO) displays and linear/rotary scale installs, amongst other operational machining maintenance and improvement work. We are appointed UK agents for HEIDENHAIN DRO and ACU-RITE DRO and machine tool equipment. This page discusses integrating these current machine tool technologies into older, legacy & obsolete machining setups
Saving Money by Upgrading Older Machine Shop Lathes and Machining Centres
It is possible to attain and maintain world-class machining accuracy without investing large sums of money into brand new machining centres. By upgrading existing, and very capable older and legacy machines & lathes, EEC install current-technology into older machine shop setups. Linear and rotary scales, along with DRO display tools augment existing machinery with vastly improved measurement & operational accuracy and features to aid machining and calculations.
Upgrading Old and Legacy Machining Tools With a New Digital Read Out
Upgrading Older Machine Shop Centres Typically Covers 2 Main Areas of Legacy Machining Upgrades:
- First time installs of current DRO equipment – integrating with older or obsolete machines & lathes
- Upgrade of current DRO systems installed on older systems – to the latest protocols and supported systems
Upgrading Old and Legacy Machine Shop Tools With High Accuracy Scales
EEC can also upgrade linear and rotary scales to current technology standards, integrating new scales with other/older brands of display and vice versa. This is an economical upgrade route for machining performance and feature improvement in cases where the customer needs better accuracy. This is possible where the electronics of display and scales are compatible.
Most machining centre or lathe upgrades are achievable – EEC carry out work to mount replacement or new scales on older machines, in some cases sourcing or manufacturing head brackets and other fixings to suit the setup.
Typically, most machine shops have Bridgeport type turret mills, Colchester/Harrison lathes and Jones & Shipman grinders albeit Surface or Cylindrical.
The display features I think are key here to aid manual milling and turning DRO displays, with operator training on-site after install , in order for operators to make the most of available features. Historically we have found that most operators have never been shown how to operate the displays and advanced the features.
