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A solid surface fabricator realised that by using CNC technology to improve sink mounts the company could install more sinks in less time using fewer router bits.

Woodworking and solid surface fabricators tend to develop a system for producing a profitable product and stick to that approach. However a solid surface fabricator found that using CNC technology could not only help the company make more money by reducing job times, but the automated production process also reduced product waste and lowered wear on tooling.

Conventional wisdom in the solid surface community says that when installing a sink, a hole is rough-cut for mounting the sink using a wooden template and it is this process which has so many solid surface fabricators shying away from sink installation. Most fabricators cut templates from particleboard using a hand router that roughly describes the shape of a sink. The template has to be considerably smaller than the hole that is actually required because the hand routing operation is so inaccurate.

Then blocks are glued on the underside of the counter to hold the sink in place and once the glue is cured, the sink is mounted and the blocks are knocked out. After the blocks are knocked out the remaining material must still be hand-routed and at times as much as a 6mm of material removed.

The entire process invariably takes 30 to 40 minutes and requires the full attention of a skilled installer as well as producing a considerable amount of wear on the expensive bits required for finishing the counter.

By using a CNC router to accurately machine the hole for a sink in solid surface material they can now complete sink installation projects more quickly and profitably. Once the sink hole is cut, the sink is mounted and glued without using blocks and then it is only necessary for any remaining excess material to be removed using a hand router.

With this new approach using the CNC router to more accurately hog out the hole the company’s process mills a 1.5mm lip under the counter to position the sink while it is glued. After the glue cures they remove the last 1.5mm of material with a hand router taking half the time and saving on router bits.

The machine’s capabilities also presented opportunities to take a look at how the company was installing sinks and design new ways to streamline the process. They created programmes to produce the holes for all of the sinks that were sold most frequently and to investigate the existing method of holding the sink in position while it is being glued to the counter. The old method took a considerable amount of time to accurately fasten the blocks in place because the hole itself was not accurate enough to use as a guide. The CNC router on the other hand can make extremely accurate holes and by milling a lip on the underside of the counter that holds the outer edges of the sink in place makes it unnecessary to use the blocks.

The first step was finding the zero-zero point for starting the router and so for each style of sink a T-square out of Plexiglas was made. The T-square hooks onto the front end of the counter to position the axis that runs from the front to the back of the counter. The T-square has a hash mark that the operator lines up with the mark on the counter that centres the sink and the actual position is provided by a 12mm hole in the T-square. The operator just draws a circle using that hole as a guide and that is used to set the reference point for the router. When a programme is installed, the actual use of the router to produce the countertop is relatively simple. The operator mounts the countertop onto the machine, selects the programme that matches the model number and the machine is ready to go. While the machine is running then the operator can make ready the next job.

When the cutting operation is completed the sink is fitted into the lip then glued; a hand router removes the last bit of material from the counter cutting the entire process down to 10/15 minutes excluding the glue dry time.

The high accuracy, ease of use and low cost of the machine was crucial to the success of this application. The machine features a positioning accuracy of ± 0.1mm in 300mm. This accuracy level is actually higher than needed but the ability to produce parts with tight tolerances proves to be a blessing in disguise allowing the company to discover new applications for the machine.

New customers either provide the design as a graphic file that is plugged into his program or the design is on paper which is then scanned it into the computer. The company also does a considerable number of stove cutouts with the router and so is building a library of those as well. Another useful area is building drop edges for counter tops as the router provides the best method by far for producing tricky radius drop edges.

Micromech is the UK distributor for Isel, if you wish to find out more about these cost effective, quality machines then contact Alan Spinks on 01376 333333 or email alan@micromech.co.uk

‘Affordable Automation’