In today’s manufacturing world, automation has become so accessible to all types of machine shops. One form of automation that has been around much longer
than collaborative robots and other assistant-style robots, is the automatic bandsaw. Today, the automatic bandsaw is using great technology to allow you to receive bars of raw material very quickly, and turn those bars into sawed blanks that are ready for manufacturing.
Often referred to as OP 0 (operation zero), the idea of tending a bandsaw for constantly removing material, loosening the vise, advancing material, retightening the vise, and finally cutting material, is a full time job. People often get consumed with receiving material and then realizing it requires so much extra work for the stock to become usable for the machines.
An automatic bandsaw from brands like Cosen or Amada have smart, intuitive controls, that allow you to select the stock length, number of cuts, and more. You can take advantage of advanced technology that allows you to make sure the cuts are straight, or at least within a certain tolerance you require. The learning curve for an automatic bandsaw, as well as the ROI, is near instant. The employee previously spending all of their time on the saw, is now freed up for other tasks in the process once the saw is set up.
The automatic saw comes in many varieties and can be a daunting cost. However, both Cosen and Amada have saws that are well within the budget of a small shop and will still achieve a positive return on investment very quickly. The cuts will remain incredibly consistent, straight, and ready to go directly into a machine for the next operation, with minimal post-cut effort. Most of our customers would see a massive improvement switching from a manual bandsaw to automatic bandsaw.
For more information on Cosen or Amada saws, or a process review from our Engineering Team, contact JBM. We’ll eliminate the amount of time you spend taking your raw materials to blanks.