According to Modig Machine Tool president, David Modig, the company’s machine tools address its customers’ core challenges and provide competitive advantages. In a Q&A session, Aerospace Manufacturing hears more.
Modig Machine Tool has always been at the forefront of innovation in developing high performance machining centres that provide its customers with a competitive advantage through increased productivity, exceptional cost-effectiveness, and unrelenting precision. In addition to the civil aerospace sector, Modig is also becoming very attractive for military and defence advanced machining solutions.
Q) Firstly, please update me with your latest news, i.e., new product launches or an aerospace customer order?
With an increasing demand for our products, we started an expansion of our facility in Kalmar last year. The new building with 9,000m2 will be ready this summer and add the necessary production area required to meet the demand and allow us to serve our customers in an even better and faster way. Also, we opened our new North American Headquarters in Wichita, Kansas in October last year.
This facility is located in Old Town, the heart of the ‘Air Capital of the World’ and will showcase the newest machines in our portfolio and is designed for training events, programming methodology, operator training, and machine maintenance. This facility is also performing machine demonstrations and run time validations which are integral parts of our run time guarantees.
During the year we have also been working with our new patented solution with inverted machining. We are really excited about this, and the first machine will be ready in the end of this year.
Q) What are the types of performance demands placed on you by your customers?
The long-term relationships with our customers. Our customer relationship has always been an important part in the Modig family spirit and will always be. There are many parts included in this such as the after-sales support.
Q) What aspects of your latest machining centres are your customers particularly happy with?
We provide our customers with turnkey solutions with a complete production line where cost per part is key. Along this is the importance of the cycle times, speeds and feeds, and machine availability.
Q) With regard to wing component manufacturing, what parts, i.e., spars, ribs, stringers, are your customers’ machine tools used mainly for?
Modig has machine tools for wing ribs, spars, and stringers with incredible machining results! The RigiMill MT (moving table) has performed amazing machining tests of aluminium wing ribs recently. Our customer achieved a time saving rate of 54% per machined part compared to conventional machining. The RigiMill is available in two versions, with a moving table or a moving gantry, and has a unique architecture as the most compact ever gantry structure with monobloc heavy cast iron bridge structure. The RigiMill compactness was purposely designed to offer a formidable agility in any axis’s situations providing with optimal cutting performances and strategies. The RigiMill MT we used for the wing rib machining was equipped with a 6m-long moving table, a HSK100 spindle and was running with 150kW and in 20,000rpm.
For stringers and spars the RigiMill MG (moving gantry) is the right solution. We have case studies showing machining of aluminium wing spars with the length of 12,300mm with a remarkable time-saving of 75%. Previous time with a well-known multi-machining centre was 26 hours and the RigiMill time was 6.5 hours.
Then when it comes to stringers, 50,000m of single aisle aluminium wing stringers are today produced in the Modig RigiMill MG every month around the world. These typical long and slim parts made of any aluminium or titanium alloys are processed on the RigiMill MG with no length limits. The most productive processes are tackled with our modular palletisation system up to 24m long pallets or, when footprint allows it, through pendular installation.
Q) What kinds of productivity benefits and synergies do your customers enjoy from the successful implementation and use of your CNC machine tools?
Modig has been in the aerospace industry for 40 years and our innovative machining solutions address the customer’s core challenges and provide a competitive advantage in industries such as aerospace. The Modig technology secures reduced cycle times, operating costs, waste and environmental impact, with valuable benefits of increased machine uptime and overall capacity.
Q) What is the main focus area of your current R&D efforts? Are there any particular ongoing research programmes you can talk about?
We are testing an even more powerful spindle for aluminium machining in the RigiMill.
Q) What differentiates your company from the CNC machine tool competition and why should a customer use you over your nearest rival?
Being a large company is not always a good thing. We are almost always smaller than our competitors and that makes us more flexible. When you buy our machines, you are not just buying a machine, you are buying a Modig. We can perform customised developments for our customers’ demands and that’s rather a rule than an exception for us.
