Safety Aspects in Design NC Turning Machines

Summary

The functions of NC turning machines are only indirectly influenced by man, through the NC program. This means that, as on all automatically operating installations, special safety considerations are called for. The technical safety measures are of a primary and secondary nature. The primary measures are to prevent malfunctions, and the secondary measures are to keep the consequences of such malfunctions to a minimum.

The Boehringer NC turning machines incorporate safety features for both groups, based on the following targets:

• Protection of the main drive by monitoring the speed and a possibly uncontrolled acceleration of the spindle speed, and also to recognise faults in the transmission of forces.

• Protection of the feed drives and the force-transmitting assemblies to prevent damages in case of collisions.

• Multiple protection of the chucking fixtures to ensure a safe workpiece clamping, and to prevent accidents from a drop in the holding pressure.

• Protection of operating personnel by providing an enclosed and monitored working area.

All these measures have contributed to such a high safety standard on the VDF-BOEHRINGER turning machines that the Factory Inspectorate concerned issued their relevant certificates.