YMT Technologies has been supplying vices and fixtures from the USA manufacturer 5th Axis for over 5 years, installing hundreds of its products in the UK market. Manufactured at 5th Axis’ headquarters in San Diego, the designs for its workholding products originated from its own requirement for fixtures for efficient and economic manufacture of the wide range of aerospace, military, medical and commercial products it produced. Now, 5th Axis is a major supplier of workholding equipment in the USA.
Just launched in the UK by YMT Technologies, is the Deuce range of vices. These feature the tried and tested dovetail technology which is used across the whole range of 5th Axis’ vices. Simple, secure and reliable workholding is achieved by machining a dovetail form in the edge of the material during the blocking up operation using the special dovetail tool supplied by YMT Technologies. There is no costly equipment required to form a profile for clamping and no extra handling. The dovetail technology is well known for its secure clamping capabilities, on as little as 1.5mm of material, enabling more aggressive machining strategies to be used with confidence. For soft materials such as aluminium, the top edge of the dovetail groove on the vice has a crimping pattern so, for lighter machining applications, there is no need to perform the dovetail machining operation.
The new Deuce vice comes in two sizes the DV56 which clamps parts up to 152mm and the DV510 which clamps parts up to 254mm. Both vices have a clamping force up to 4000 lbs and a jaw length of 127mm. A knurled screw quickly closes the vice ready for final tightening with a torque wrench, speeding up vice loading.
Fitted with a removable centre jaw, the vices can clamp four components simultaneously, doubling their potential capacity, and the quick change jaws can be changed without dismantling the vice. Jaws can also be reversed for extra capacity and options include double station soft jaws. These features enable more parts to be machined in one setting increasing productivity while maintaining flexibility.
Drop Lock quick change accessories make it possible to remove and replace vices in seconds. Furthermore, multiple vices can be quickly and easily be located on the machine table or on a tombstone to maximise machine capacity. These quick change accessories allow manufacture to continue with the more preloaded vices with the minimum delay, locating the new billets accurately, rapidly and securely ready for continuous machining, while the 96mm square pull stud pattern makes them compatible with other accessories on the market.
