EoW November 2009

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EuroWire – November 2009 63
Testing & measuring
Analysis of cable insulation and sheathing
SETIC’s MPE 120 high precision slicing/fending-off machine is specially designed to
cut and shave off smooth test pieces of insulation and sheathing material. The process
allows accurate and repeatable measurement conforming to international standard
IEC 811-1-1. Compared to ground
samples – involving micro irregularities
– productivity is much higher as
several preparation steps to obtain
a precise cable section are avoided.
Characteristics of the material can be
reduced, allowing the use of cheaper
compounds.
The strip to be shaved is placed
between two feeding rollers, which
push the product against a surgical
blade. The shaving thickness is
adjusted through a precision screw,
allowing a final strip from 0.6mm to
2mm thickness with perfect parallel
and smooth, mark free, faces. Precision
is said to be better than 0.05mm.
SETIC-Gauder Group – France
Fax: +33 477 71 1085
Email:
Website:
Manual spring tester
The increasing use of powerful miniaturised mechanical and electro-mechanical units
is influencing product development in many sectors, including the automobile industry
and medical technology. Springs used for these applications are also becoming ever
smaller, but must still deliver precision and reliability, placing greater demands on
testing technology.
To meet this challenge, Zwick has developed a new high-precision spring-testing
instrument featuring fast, easy operation. This hand-operated spring tester records
spring compression stress-strain characteristics in full, with no need to stop at
the measuring points. Load and deflection are recorded synchronously. Intensive
development work has created a system that is said to guarantee highly accurate
test results. One important factor in this is mechanical compensation of load cell
deformation, ensuring maximum precision in deflection measurement under load
(resolution 0.2µm). The reference line of the deflection measuring system lies along
the same axis as the spring length being measured, practically eliminating the length
measurement error. Other important factors in providing highly accurate measurement
are the extremely stiff load frame and load application aligned to the specimen
centreline, resulting in minimal elasticity through the entire test arrangement.
Integrated mechanical overload protection of the load cell provides reliable damage
prevention, avoiding tester downtime and load cell replacement and calibration costs.
The machine possesses three adjustable mechanical limit switch stops for starting
position, pre-stress length and minimum permissible test length. The new spring tester
is suitable for production line use and in design and development, while standard
interfaces enable connection of additional measuring equipment such as dimensional
measuring devices. The addition of the proven testXpert® II testing software to the
manually-operated spring tester produces an ideal package for testing small springs
and ensures simple, quick, safe and reliable testing.
The testXpert® II Test Program is ideally adapted to the requirements of spring testing.
Contents include integrated histogram and statistics functions, pre-defined specific
results, online graph and test result recording plus optional statistical process control
(SPC) functions, while flexible, efficient interfaces allow testXpert® II to communicate
with an organisation’s IT infrastructure.
Zwick GmbH – Germany Fax: +49 7305 10200
Email: Website :
The SETIC MPE 120 ▲ ▲