Milling

Our CNC milling department is our most recent addition to our shop. The main difference between traditional mills and traditional lathes is whether the material moves or the tools. Our mills allow for more customization of parts because they can hold more cutting tools. 

Instead of being restricted to round or symmetrical parts, mills are able to cut prismatic or oddly shaped parts from a block of material. This makes milling crucial to being able to expand what designs we are able to create. 

Mill cutting tools rotate at various speeds depending on the type of the material. The tools will rotate and lower in order to cut away from the block of material on the surface below. Using Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM), mills are easier to program. Using CAD, we are able to upload a 3D model of your part and program the mill to cut your part.  CNC mills are traditionally hand loaded. We have operators running our prototype and short run milled parts. We have robots to lower the cost of machining long run milling jobs, as well as our Willeman-Macodel machine available for super precise extremely complex production parts.  The Willeman-Macodel is a bar fed milling machine that can run completely unattended.  

The mills also enhance our size range. Our CNC milling machines are able to manufacture parts that are larger in size than our CNC lathes. By offering CNC milling services, we are able to do parts that require more horsepower and rigidity than the milling capabilities available on the lathes. Mills are capable of threading, shaping, drilling, creating angles, and more. Mills are great for parts that are not round, off center, or have designs that wouldn’t be easily calculated for programming by hand. We are able to maintain the high precision our customers have come to expect, while simultaneously providing a more complex design. 

Swissomation also has Mill-Turning capabilities. To learn more about this, click here.