Based in Sutton-in-Ashfield, R&D Leverage UK provides equipment for the European plastic packaging industry, including the food and beverage, medical, cosmetics, household and personal-care markets.

The company — a subsidiary of its parent in the USA — produces one-stage injection stretch blow-mould (ISBM) tooling for PET (polyethylene terephthalate) containers.

Certified to BS EN ISO 9001:2000, R&D Leverage UK is equipped with a wide range of design, production and inspection aids to help ensure the on-time and on-budget delivery of premium-quality moulds.

The company also believes in purchasing the best and most productive machines to maximise its competitiveness, as demonstrated by the recent purchase of a second Studer S31 cylindrical grinder from Micronz Ltd (www.micronz.co.uk) — the Swiss manufacturer’s UK agent in Mold (Wales).

Alan Tolley, managing director of R&D Leverage UK, said: “We provide complete solutions for a wide range of packaging sectors across Europe and beyond; we have established an excellent reputation for the reliability of our products and for our use of the best available technology.

“When investing in machine tools, our aim is to maintain our high quality standards, while ensuring that we can manufacture our moulds even faster than before.

“Before purchasing our first Studer S31 grinder, we searched for a machine that would satisfy both our quality and efficiency requirements; and having seen demonstrations of several suitable machines, the Studer S31 matched our exact needs; we were also pleasantly surprised that its cost was very close to that of less capable grinders.

“Following its installation, our first Studer grinder was soon turning out the required volumes of ground components — and achieving excellent dimensional and surface finish characteristics.

“When the demand for ground parts increased recently, we remained loyal to the Studer brand and Micronz.

“Our new Studer S31 cylindrical grinder is also producing high volumes of premium-quality ground components — and it has eliminated the possibility of bottlenecks in our grinding department.”

Machine details

The Studer S31 is a compact CNC universal cylindrical grinding machine designed for the external and internal grinding of medium-size workpieces in a single clamping — in both small- and large-batch production runs.

Accommodating workpieces with a maximum weight of 120kg, it has distances between centres of 650 or 1,000mm (depending on specification) and a centre height of 175mm.

The machine features a substantial base made of Granitan. This mineral casting material (polymer concrete) was developed by Studer and has proven its efficiency over many years; it is produced in the company’s own plant.

Granitan’s properties have been designed to ensure high levels of surface quality on the ground workpieces and an increased service life for the grinding wheels.

Meanwhile, the S31’s full enclosure allows the use of emulsions or oils as cooling lubricants, while two large sliding doors provide with easy access to the working area.

For automated 24hr running, handling devices can be connected via the machine’s loader interface.

The S31’s V and flat guideways on the longitudinal and cross slides are moulded directly into the machine base and have a Granitan S200 slideway coating; this arrangement is designed to provide high levels of accuracy and load capacity throughout the machine’s entire speed range, along with optimised damping properties.

The swivelling wheel-head, which allows external, internal and form grinding in a single clamping, is equipped with a liquid-cooled maintenance-free motor spindle (mounted on roller bearings) with steplessly variable speed control.

External grinding wheels with a diameter of 500mm and a width of 63mm (80mm on F5 model) are fitted to the shaft ends, while high-frequency spindles with an external diameter of 120mm are used for internal grinding.

Furthermore, the machine’s C-axis work-head supports accurate form and thread grinding, while Studer’s grinding software with ‘pictogramming’ allows less-experienced users to quickly optimise the full potential of the S31.

StuderGrind software is available for form and thread grinding.