Wisbech-based subcontractor Avant Manufacturing was using four 40-taper, 3-axis VMCs (vertical machining centres) when, towards the end of 2024, a sharp upturn in existing and new business meant that an extra machine was needed quickly.
Dominic Roach, who founded the company in April 2021, wanted to install a 5-axis production centre to reap the benefits of fewer reclampings of parts. The advantages are principally higher speed of production, and less risk of errors and damage to workpieces due to excessive manual handling. He also wanted to be able to produce more complex components, preferably in one hit. However, the space remaining on the shop floor was limited and 5-axis machines tend to be large.
The answer to the conundrum was to install a Brother Speedio U500Xd1 5-axis, swivelling-trunnion VMC with a 30-taper spindle from Whitehouse Machine Tools, sole UK agent for the Japanese manufacturer. Having a 1,560 x 2,026 mm footprint, the machine fitted neatly into the available space when it was delivered in December 2024.
First class honours engineering graduate Dominic Roach (left), owner of Avant Manufacturing, and Tom Newman, who was next to join the company in January 2022. There are now five employees.
Subcontractors are increasingly moving towards the 30-taper interface, especially with the BIG-Plus face and taper contact option, as it combines 40-taper rigidity with the exceptionally high speed motions of which the smaller form factor machines are capable.
Mr Roach commented, “The Brother practically sold itself. We couldn’t find a 40-taper machine that would fit, while other 30-taper equipment suppliers had a limited number of production platforms and automation possibilities in their range, which would have limited our future options.
“Additionally, I was drawn to the Brother because it is a true 5-axis machine, not a 3-axis model with a bolt-on compound table. An added bonus is that Whitehouse offers unlimited ongoing technical support and is very quick to respond when we have a query. Someone always gets back to us within half an hour.”
The M200X3 is one of 10 VMCs on the shop floor at R&A, working alongside eight CNC turning centres.
As he was swapping to a smaller diameter tool holder that he had never used before, Mr Roach was keen to satisfy himself that the Brother machine was powerful enough to remove metal quickly. Admittedly most of the material going through the shop is aluminium, with the remainder mainly plastic, but often billets are reduced to 10% of their original size, such as a medical robot part that is regularly produced. In one recent instance, a 72 kg block of 6082 aluminium was milled down to a weight of 4 kg, a reduction of more than 94%.
With a similar aluminium billet and some Ceratizit roughing end mills, he drove 100 miles west to Whitehouse Machine Tools’ showroom and technical centre in Kenilworth to put a U500Xd1 through its paces. He said, “I was impressed not only by the metal removal rate, but also by the size of parts that can be produced in such a small footprint.
“I would have no hesitation producing components from tougher materials either, as it’s an easy matter to change the machining strategy to limit the width and depth of cut and increase the spindle speed and feed rate.”
All programming is off-line at a seat of Autodesk Fusion.
Since there was an urgent need in Wisbech for the additional spindle, he decided to rent a U500Xd1 straight away ahead of taking delivery in April 2025 of a more capable model, a U500Xd2. Whitehouse duly supplied the rental machine and provided two days of on-site training.
The upgraded U500Xd2 has longer travels in X and Y, giving a working volume of 500 x 450 x 380 mm. Rotary axis motions are the same, as are the 16,000 rpm BIG-Plus spindle and the 28-position tool magazine, but the control is full 5-axis rather than 4+1. A high-accuracy mode option with 1000-block look-ahead has been selected, as well as 35 bar high pressure coolant, and Blum probes for checking cutter length and workpiece position. Chip-to-chip time is fast at 1.4 seconds owing to simultaneous tool change and rapid traverse in the linear and rotary axes.
To indicate how much faster the U500Xd1 is, and the U500Xd2 will be, compared to one of his 40-taper VMCs, Mr Roach cited a scientific part produced from solid aluminium that formerly required four separate set-ups on 3-axis machines. The number of operations has been halved and the same component is now produced in 36% of the time. That is because although Op 1 is the same, Ops 2, 3 and 4 are now completed on the 5-axis Brother in a single clamping using the rotary axes to position the part for 5-sided machining.
The rotary axes of the VMC are part of the machine design, not added on.
A job completed in January 2025, involving drilling 60 holes at eight different angles into a medical plastic block, could not have feasibly been done on the 3-axis machines. So the availability of the Brother is allowing Avant Manufacturing to gain new business that it previously had to turn down.
A difference that was noticeable immediately the U500Xd1 was installed was the better milled surface finish on components, which far surpasses any customer requirement received to date. Dimensional tolerances held are tight, down to below 10 microns, despite there being no temperature control in the factory.
Looking to the future, for obvious reasons Mr Roach is looking to move to larger premises and has first refusal on an adjacent unit on his current industrial estate in Wisbech. He is committed to continuing the journey towards 30-taper, 5-axis machining to provide increased capacity for both large and small batch production, especially for the medical, pharmaceutical and scientific industries that he mainly serves, as well as for the control, automation and defence sectors.
