Compact cable guidance to the milling head of a machine tool

• What was needed: energy chain of the B15i and B17 series
• Requirements: Guidance of a large number of cables in the tightest of spaces and at high traversing accelerations
• Industry: Machine tool manufacturing, CNC milling centre
• Success for the customer: two interlocking energy chains utilise the available installation space perfectly and guide all cables safely; the chains are modified to enable a reverse bend radius

Chiron-Werke GmbH is a manufacturer of CNC-controlled machining centres. In a milling centre from the machine specialist, the swivel head rotates by over 90° around the workpiece to be machined. This enables faster machining of the workpiece and means a reduction in costs thanks to even more machining options with a single machining centre.
The problem with this application was to realise the cable routing to the milling head from a large number of cables in an extremely confined installation space and under high accelerations (approx. 540° per second and approx. 90 movements per minute). It was necessary to make optimum use of the installation space and at the same time not reduce the service life of the energy supply and cable.
Another challenge was that both energy chains had to be equipped with several links that could realise reverse bending.

The machine manufacturer opted for an energy chain solution from the igus® product portfolio. Based on all the mechanical parameters, the best technical cable routing for the requirement profile consisted of two B15i and B17 series energy chains, one inside the other. The B15i running on the inside is accompanied by the slightly larger B17 energy chain on the outside. Due to the tight installation space and the required pivoting movement, individual chain links of the chain were reworked and provided with a reverse bend radius. Due to the connection at the moving end, a special solution also had to be designed that fixes both energy chains to the moving end at the same time. A special connector is used in the application today for this purpose. The compact energy chains were able to accommodate the particularly tight installation space in the application. At the same time, they safely guide all cables in the system, even at high and fast travelling speeds.