What are the difficulties in processing medical device parts
In the face of the epidemic situation in the last few years, the medical device industry is showing a dynamic growth trend. The processing of medical devices is required to be higher by difficult to process materials, complex workpiece shapes and frequent small batch production. So what problems will exist when processing medical device parts? Dongguan Lifei Xiaobian explains the new problems faced by medical parts processing for everyone?
The medical device industry has put forward new requirements for professional precision tools
Difficult to machine materials, complex workpiece shapes and frequent small batch production put forward high requirements for cutting tools used to process professional medical devices. For example, transplant products and artificial limbs play a very important role in successful surgical operations and can help surgeons achieve the best medical results. The quality of medical devices is largely determined by the cutting tools for processing medical devices.
1、 Processing materials of medical spare parts are difficult to process:
90% of medical device implant components are made of Ti6Al-4V titanium alloy, which is light, high strength and high biocompatibility. Titanium alloy 6AL-4V has become the most commonly used material for medical implant devices. Titanium alloy 6AL-4V is usually used for the fabrication of hip joints, bone screws, knee joints, bone plates, dental implants, and spine connecting elements. Titanium alloy has the characteristics of work hardening. In the machining process, the shearing angle is large, the chip generated is thin, and a relatively small contact area is formed on the tool. In addition, the high cutting force in the machining process, combined with the friction force during chip flow, will comprehensively lead to excessive local cutting heat of the tool. However, because of the poor thermal conductivity of titanium alloy, the cutting heat cannot be transferred quickly. Therefore, a large amount of cutting heat is concentrated on the cutting edge and tool surface.
High cutting force and cutting heat will comprehensively cause crescent depression and rapid tool failure.
1. Reliable and compact machine tool fixture
Medical device processing equipment needs to be able to process small and complex parts made of difficult to process materials (such as titanium alloy or stainless steel) with high accuracy requirements, such as processing bone and joint substitutes. Due to the poor cutting performance of the material to be machined, the blank is usually bar stock - which means that a large amount of metal needs to be removed. As a result, some parts are cast to the shape close to the finished product, but this also adds to the trouble of making complex and expensive fixtures. Another factor that increases processing complexity is the narrow tolerance range.
Medical device parts require high workpiece materials, processing accuracy, surface finish, etc., which requires high reliability of the processing system. Thus, it puts forward high requirements for machine tools, jigs, tools, CAM software, etc. Workpieces are usually processed on advanced medical equipment such as Swiss automatic lathes, multi spindle machine tools and rotary worktables. These machine tools are mostly characterized by very small size and compact structure
