Posted to News on 31st Oct 2024, 11:30
Roller screws help Wymbs Engineering improve productivity
When bakery industry machine supplier Wymbs Engineering set about upgrading an existing design for improved productivity, it set actuator supplier Ewellix a challenge: to deliver a motion solution that would enable the new generation machine to operate a third faster than the previous one.
In the culinary world, there is an expression: you eat with your eyes first. Exquisite, eye-pleasing dishes and confectionary can either help make a sale in a bakery or add a good level of panache to a meal in a restaurant. Wymbs Engineering believes this also to be true. In the world of large-batch and mass production, the creation of similarly appealing artisan products relies incredibly heavily on a machine's design.
Managing Director Brendan Wymbs founded the company thirty years ago from a small fabrication work-shop in Stockport, north-west England, servicing and upgrading 'worn out' machinery in the bakery and confectionery industries. Today, the company plays a leading role as a manufacturer of a unique range of pressurised, manifold depositing systems, as well as customised processing lines for the chilled foods sector, such as cream doughnuts and chocolate eclairs, to name a few.
Wymbs Engineering has had a long relationship with Ewellix, and the ball screw used in some of the company's older machines needed to be upgraded with something longer lasting and with a higher load capacity. "We installed a machine that was depositing 756,000 dough drops every hour on a travelling band, and this ran at up to 50 cycles per minute," explained Brendan. "We had good results, but the life of the Z-axis ball screw was approximately 8-10 months."
10% productivity increase
Brendan asked Ewellix to develop a solution for the new line it was setting up. The new design had to deposit 831,000 dough drops per hour (75,000 more than the previous machine) and still give extended life on the Z-axis.
Ewellix designed in its roller screw SRC 30x5 arrangement because the distance travelled was not enough for a standard ball screw to recirculate the balls and grease. Thanks to their high precision and rigidity, roller screws are the ideal choice for heavy loads, long duty cycles, high speeds, high accelerations, and harsh operating conditions.
"We now have a 10% increase in the number of dough drops per hour, better longevity, and obviously, a better return on our investment," says Brendan.
Roller screws allow machine builders to design the most compact, powerful, and reliable linear motion systems. Ewellix, a Schaeffler company, is a pioneer in this field and offers the vast range of high-performance roller screws.
