Precision Slitting

Select complete tooling sets for repeated widths... let us design a shimless tooling system for a virtually burr-free-state-of-the-art slitting capability...or choose from a wide variety of individual slitting tools.

Our Sales Engineers are ready to assist you in realizing longer knife life, cleaner cuts, and higher quality output.

Dedicated Knife Sets

Does your company slit narrow, repeat width jobs that demand high precision tolerances and require complicated setups?

If so, you may be a good candidate for a complete pre-assembled knife set that is dedicated to those slit widths.

These dedicated knife systems, also referred to as quill sets, are mounted onto a quill shaft that simply slides onto your existing shaft and is immediately ready to use.

A typical knife set consists of a top and bottom quill mounted onto upper and lower driven arbors (see figure #1 below). A guide blade is used to prevent one quill from moving laterally away from the other. End blades handle scrap removal, while alternating knives and bonded stripper rings, dimensioned to the slit widths and clearances desired, do the actual finish cuts. Filler spacers are used to complete any unused portion of the quill shaft, with locking retaining nuts holding the components in place. All components should be specified to a thickness tolerance of ±.000040 inches.

The width of the steel core of the bonded stripper rings dictate what the horizontal clearances will be (see figure #2 below). For example, if you are slitting .003" material using a 10% clearance to a 1.000" width, you would want the stripper ring to be 1.0006" wide and the knife to be 1.000" wide, guaranteeing a .0003" clearance between the knives for correct penetration to fracture. Your slit material will have a plus tolerance. If the plus tolerance is undesirable, you would specify the stripper ring to be 1.000" and the knife to be .9994"., while still guaranteeing the .0003" clearance on each side of the knife. Different quill sets would have to be used when the thickness of the material changes in order to maintain proper clearances; thus the term "dedicated knife sets".

The main advantage of the preassembled sets:

• They are quickly interchanged for different jobs
• They are easily maintained and can be ground as a set
• They take the guesswork out of clearance setting
• They are easily adaptable to existing equipment

A good candidate for dedicated knife sets would be a strapping company that slits the same widths continually, but may have four different gauges for the same width. With four quill sets, they can change out jobs quickly and efficiently without too much preplanning.

If the correct horizontal clearances are known and the tooling is manufactured to tolerances of ±.000040", there should be little if any, burr. Figure #3, below, shows the ideal condition for penetration to fracture when the horizontal clearances are correct.

Dedicated knife sets have been used successfully for over 25 years and were actually the first shimless application of precision tolerance tooling. DIENES takes great pride in having pioneered the manufacture and use of dedicated systems throughout the world.

If these systems make sense for your company, let our experienced Sales Engineers know your requirements.

If your needs are wider ranging, possibly one complete shimless tooling system could be designated to fully address your requirements while providing you with the accuracy and precision of dedicated knife sets. Once again, let us know we are always happy to serve our customers.