The Spanish company Sermati (www.sermati.com) — a Tier One and Tier Two supplier to the aerospace, defence and energy sectors — has installed a pair of Fox gantry-type vertical milling machines from the Correa Group, following a series of demanding tests against competitor products.

After selecting manufacturers that offered large machining centres combining high levels of power, torque and speed with ‘dynamic axes’, it was decided to subject them to a titanium-machining test.

The condition of the test was to perform a 25mm-deep chatter-free cut using an end mill with the ram fully extended. The Fox machining centre managed to reach 60mm, out-performing the other machines.

Correa says that the UAD machining head for three-axis operation of the Fox machining centre is rated at 52kW (1,300Nm of torque) and 6,000rev/min. It is complemented by the UGV head for five-axis operation; this is rated at 35kW (190Nm of torque) and 12,000rev/min.

Available for automatic loading straight from the adjacent magazine, the two heads allow the machine to undertake heavy roughing operations on the most difficult materials, and to finish complex shapes with maximum precision, says the company.

Mikael Helloco, purchasing manager at Sermati, said: “As soon as the two Fox machining centres had been ordered, we went to see our customers with the details of the investment.

“By the time we had finished installing the first machine, we already had sufficient work for two eight-hour shifts.”