Electroimpact has designed and manufactured a flexible tooling system for the E7000-ARJ horizontal panel riveter. This tooling design accommodates panel sizes from 3.5m to 10m long, with a variety of straight and tapered curvatures. The tooling is re-configured manually and utilizes removable index plates that can be adapted to accommodate new panel types.
This type of tooling is ideal for value-conscious applications where a single machine must process a large range of panel styles. Electroimpact is currently using this system to tool 17 different styles of pre-tacked panels on a single E7000-ARJ machine. This flexible system does not require large removable form boards or custom frames that index one type of panel. Instead it uses 4 form boards that are permanently mounted to the picture frame by linear rails, allowing them to index anywhere along the 10m working envelope. Each form board holds several rail mounted surface indexes that are adjusted to accommodate different panel curvatures.
All index locations on the form boards and the sliding indexes are set by lightweight, removable, aluminum index plates. This allows for new index locations to be quickly added without the use of lifting equipment, and reduces storage area required for additional indexes.
The simplicity of the tooling and its ability to quickly adapt to new panel types allow this system to provide a large amount of flexibility at a low cost. This is an ideal solution for value-conscious applications where various panel types need to be indexed on a single machine.
