What is the difference between a CNC milling machine and a machining center?

What is the difference between a CNC milling machine and a machining center? In fact, this problem is not only confusing for laymen, but also many people in the industry are stupid and unclear. Simply put, the machining center is an upgraded version of the CNC milling machine. If the CNC milling machine is compared to a steel saint, then the machining center is at the level of the golden saint. In fact, these two kinds of processing equipment are mainly different in the following three aspects:

The biggest difference is whether it has a tool magazine

Ordinary CNC milling machines also have a CNC operating system (such as FANUC, Siemens, China Huazhong or Guangshu, etc.), and also have three feed axes and a rotating spindle. Their machining mode geometry is exactly the same, and Basically, the same processing capability can be achieved. And the biggest difference between them is to see whether the equipment has a tool magazine. The machining center is actually a CNC milling machine with a tool magazine. The machining center can complete multiple machining operations, such as milling, drilling, and clamping at one time. Tapping processing, etc., because it can realize automatic tool replacement, and in the continuous processing of multiple processes, the operator does not need manual intervention, as long as the program is programmed, the tool and the corresponding parameters are configured. Up. This is not the case with the CNC milling machine. The CNC milling machine can also realize multiple processes at one time. The difference is that in the process conversion process, the tool must be changed manually, so the processing process is discontinuous and intermittent to many degrees. Implementation, such processing is slightly inferior to the processing center in terms of processing quality and processing efficiency.

So when you see a piece of equipment in the future, you can directly determine whether it is a CNC milling machine or a machining center by whether it has a tool magazine. This is the gold standard.

Is it full protection

In fact, this is not absolute for many equipment. Many CNC milling machines have gradually begun to be fully protected. Of course, there are also many old-fashioned CNC milling machines that are still open or semi-protected. Way, this is somewhat different from the current machining center to a certain extent, of course, this difference is not absolute (again).

In fact, this has a lot to do with the development process of equipment. In the initial stage of numerical control of processing equipment, in fact, many manufacturers do not pay much attention to appearance design and safety protection, and basically stay on the demand for functions, so many numerical control The milling machines are all made into an open form, or a better one is a semi-open form. Although this kind of CNC milling machine does not have too many defects in function, it still has a lot of problems in terms of processing safety and processing environment. Big shortcomings. For example, the high-temperature iron filings produced by processing will splash on the human body and cause harm to the human body. The coolant used to cool the tool during the processing will also splash on the operator, soiling the operator’s clothes, etc., so although the production equipment With the advancement of research and development, especially the invasion of foreign high-end equipment, the design and manufacturing of processing equipment in our country is also moving towards a more humane, more beautiful, and more artistic road. This is a process, and any progress requires a process. Product technology and product art are the unified requirements for industrial products in the future and the only way for the future development of industrial products.

Whether with automatic chip conveyor

This criterion is the same as the previous one. It is not an absolute criterion. It is also a mobile criterion based on the development process of processing equipment. The reason is also because of the hindsight functions of the previous equipment in the research and development. As a result of the trade-off, many new-style CNC milling machines, full protection and automatic chip conveyors are basically standard equipment, and there is not much difference from the machining center. But for those old-fashioned CNC milling machines, this criterion is still valid. After all, a device that is not even protected is not daring to ask for automatic chip removal in any case. In fact, the current machinery industry practitioners should be grateful. This era, it is this era that provides the technology and ability to liberate our hands, allowing us to engage in our own jobs more easily and efficiently, and with the all-round development of Industry 4.0, this liberation of labor is also frantically speeding up , And even the elimination of a lot of labor or labor methods, we must always be prepared.

Based on the above reasons, if you want to choose a piece of equipment, of course it is better to choose a machining center. At least the machining efficiency is much higher and the machining range is much larger, especially when used with the fourth-axis rotary table. It’s an artifact. If you want to learn a processing equipment, you should also learn the operation of the machining center. At least the programming is more complicated, and the design of the fixture and the preparation of the processing technology are also more complicated. After all, the compound processing needs to be tested. Technology and ability, of course, this is also the guarantee of processing quality.