CASE STUDY

Prototype Tool Machining with TC760X

Problem

Urbineer

needed a tooling board that offered a higher service temperature and an improved machining

environment, whilst maintaining the toughness and durability required for manufacturing precision

prototypes.

Prototyping requires moving between metal and epoxy boards on the milling machine, creating a large

amount of dust that requires extensive extraction and a lengthy clean-up process, taking time to complete.

“We needed a solution that offered toughness, durability and stability, allowing us to fabricate high

tolerance parts and multipiece tools that not only hold their tolerances but also give the desired nish.”

Stuart Marshall Co-founder and CEO of Urbineer

Background

Urbineer

design, engineer and manufacture composite prototype and technical demonstrator parts for the

aerospace industry, with expertise in advanced lightweight composite airframes and structures. Finding the

right tooling board material is vital for this industry as absolute precision and high performance is key.

Solution

While machining with different tools, Urbineer

found that the TC760X board would slice the material

resulting in akes instead of creating the large amounts of dust that typical epoxy boards produce, even

during aggressive roughing passes on the CNC milling machine. This made for a much cleaner machining

environment and reduced clean-up time.

By using indexable inserts on the machine cutter, Urbineer

discovered TC760X did not chip at the edges

and the roughing passes could be accomplished efciently, reducing the time on the mill with limited wear

to the cutters.

“I have used Trelleborg tooling boards for many years and was excited about the advantages that

TC760X offered. There was no learning curve required and the dust free machining environment and

surface nish that we were able to achieve will make us a long-term user.” Stuart Marshall Co-founder

and CEO of Urbineer

Typically, epoxy tooling boards require several hours of manual sanding to achieve a high-quality nish, with

the risk of potentially changing the surface prole tolerance by hand sanding. Using TC760X, Urbineer

able to produce a machined nish tool that requires minimal post-mill sanding, ensuring the surface prole

remains unchanged.

An additional benet of using TC760X was the machined nish achieved with reduced mill passes; the tool

only required a few coats of sealer compared to the usual 8 or 9 to achieve a high gloss nish. Tools could

then be released to use for direct to part manufacturing, speeding up the overall production time.

The high Glass Transition Temperature (Tg) of TC760X allows Urbineer

to direct cut tooling and not be

limited to prepreg part materials with low initial curing capabilities. The high Tg of +140 OC (Tg is the

temperature at which the material transitions from its glass state to a rubbery state) means parts can be

cured at typical aerospace temperatures, without tool degradation, providing a faster curing time.

“We fabricate high tolerance parts from tooling and TC760X has the durability and toughness to

make multipiece tools that not only hold the tolerances but the desired nish directly on the mill. The

toughness and durability of the TC760X material enables us to create the sharp edges needed to match

tool sections together.” Stuart Marshall Co-founder and CEO of Urbineer

“I appreciate when companies like Trelleborg keep developing products that increase the quality and

performance that we are able to offer our customers”. Stuart Marshall Co-founder and CEO of Urbineer