Cooled Ball Screws

When manufacturers use CNC milling machines or machine tools to serially manufacture parts, they expect gage accuracy to be maintained for all manufactured parts and, at the same time, a reduction in the machine's total non-productive time. For the ball screw drive as a performing part in the power flow, this implies repetitive motion with high rapid traverse speeds and acceleration values. These high dynamic stresses cause unequal heating of the ball screw drive. Preloading increases this heating which seriously reduces the lifetime of the ball screw drive. The transfer of heat to other machine tool parts can adversely affect the accuracy of the work piece. These inaccuracies accumulate during the course of production, with very undesirable impact.

Separate consideration of shaft cooling

Gage accuracy with simultaneous high dynamic performance can only be maintained if operating temperatures are kept constant. It is not always the best solution to cool just one component in the ball screw. The non-uniform temperature rise in the components is accompanied by expansion in diverse directions. The shaft and nut cooling, as well as the type of preloading are separately considered in the initial design phase to ensure the options are correctly combined with the load requirements during the second stage of the design. As a longstanding development partner of renowned machine manufacturers, Steinmeyer offers production-proven solutions.