Guarding against inefficiency

One of the world’s most famous manufacturers of guarding for machinery, Procter Machine Safety, is benefiting from the performance and quality attributes of a newly installed Trumpf TruBend 5130 CNC press brake.

The machine has been acquired to increase bending capacity at the company’s 100-employee Caerphilly manufacturing plant, where it has been joined by Trumpf’s TruTops Boost programming software.
“To be honest, we assumed that Trumpf machines would be too expensive, so we initially discounted them for that reason,” says John Procter, the company’s director of machine safety. “Nevertheless, we arranged a visit and were not only impressed with the press brakes on offer, but the prices were cheaper than we envisaged.”
The TruBend 5130 offers features such as lower tool displacement and five-axis back-gauge functionality. Since installation, the machine has been set to work producing parts for machine guards made from mild steel, aluminium and stainless steel, typically from 1 to 5 mm in thickness. Many of the parts are made to order, so are either 1-offs or low in batch size.
“We like the bending aid,” states Procter. “This helps with lifting and has allowed us to increase efficiencies due to less man-hours being required on any given job. Ultimately we have been able to cut shifts by up to half. In addition, thanks to the capabilities of the Trumpf TruBend 5130, we can now bend parts that were previously not possible.”
In terms of tangible savings, the press brake has made a positive contribution to the company’s bottom line. “I would estimate that the machine is around 15% faster than our existing press brake capacity,” explains Procter. “In addition, we are enjoying labour cost savings, as well as benefiting from less human error, which in turn means reduced scrap.”
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