Designing a Special for a Legacy Part

Tri-Tec Manufacturing

800-338-0276 www.tritecmfg.com

SOLUTION PROVIDER

Heule Tool Corp. 513-848-7235 www.heuletool.com

CHALLENGE

Re-manufacture a part in which the original back spot-facing tool’s limited diameter range wouldn’t have worked for the larger spot facing needed and the indexable insert for the tool was no longer available.

SOLUTION

Aspecial back spot-facing tool. Tri-Tec Manufacturing designs and builds remote actuation assemblies, such as vent valves and actuators, for U.S. Navy ships.

The parts are often installed in critical safety systems like flood boundaries and must withstand demanding conditions. These ships typically stay in service for decades, which can create challenges for the Kent, Washington-based manufacturer. In addition to providing new OEM components, Tri-Tec services older parts as well, which is an area that often leads to problems when the original tools used to create the part initially are no longer supported by the vendor. That was the case when they received a Navy actuator housing for repair.

The job required re-machining a critical surface deep inside a bronze casting, accessed through a narrow hole. It was a long-serving part, but the previous tools were not available. Tri-Tec needed a viable solution — fast — and called Heule Tool Corp. in Loveland, Ohio, based on the manufacturer’s success with the toolmaker’s back boring products.

“Ships have 40-, 50-year lives, so a lot of things we do, we’re going to keep doing down the road,” said Mark Smith, lead manufacturing engineer at Tri-Tec, which supports ongoing repair work and maintains critical components throughout the life of the fleet. Sometimes, Tri-Tec has to rework a decades-old part and is constantly addressing new challenges as tools and technology evolve. “We have more than 20,000 unique part numbers,” Smith said, “but, oftentimes, our orders will be 10 or 15 parts. We’re almost like a job shop in that way.” Tri-Tec first purchased a B series 11 mm (0.43") back spot-facing tool for a Navy repair application to replace an unsupported BSF tool, for which the indexable insert was no longer available.

The manufacturer uses this tool to produce a long-established design part. However, as new development projects arose, Tri-Mec purchased an A series BSF-A-650/040-7.0 with BSF-M-A-1A-6.0 to do the 13.21 mm-dia.

(0.520") BSF for a new development project’s version “1” prototype. This tool was used for a part with interrupted cuts. Ongoing support from Heule reportedly provides a bridge between Tri-Tec’s older applications and new developments, helping the manufacturer continue to serve clients with effective solutions.

The actuator housing being prototyped in this case was made from C86300 manganese bronze. Inside the casting, four raised mounting pads needed to be machined to create smooth, flat surfaces to support a transformer. These back spot faces needed to be cut from inside the housing, through a 6.53 mm (0.257") access hole, to a finished diameter of 13.21 mm.