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The Tiger-Tec Silver WPP05S insert grade is a wear-resistant, indexable TNGG Insert grade from Walter USA said to deliver high performance and productivity in steel machining, particularly for roughing forged components Cemented Carbide Inserts and long production runs. The insert’s thicker Tiger-Tec Silver coating offers optimized aluminum oxide microstructure, while its post-coating treatment provides greater reliability, increased toughness and reduced downtime due to chipping, especially in high-volume production. The inserts are capable of operating reliably at high cutting speeds with greater metal removal rates, and are said to provide increased tool life at high speeds.

The insert grade is designed with a new substrate said to better resist plastic deformation. According to the company, this is particularly important at higher cutting speeds required for increased productivity. In addition, a thicker cobalt-enriched zone yields greater toughness and process reliability. The inserts are available in MP3, MP5, RP5 and NRF geometries.

Walter Surface Technologies has released its Zip shoulder milling cutters Titan and Chopcut Titan abrasive cutting disks designed for cutting titanium and brass with exceptional efficiency. Both the Zip Titan and Chopcut Titan are made with a silicon-carbide-based formulation to prevent the materials being cut from overheating, the company says; keeping the metal cooler helps to preserve the mechanical properties and surface integrity of titanium and brass.

The products are both said to offer a longer lifespan than other, similar disks. The company explains that the efficient cutting action of the wheel prevents it from overheating, which is the number one risk for cutoff wheels. These disks are intended to provide more cuts per wheel as well as faster and freer cuts, increasing job productivity and lowering costs.

The Zip Titan is part of the company’s Zip family of cutting wheel products gravity turning inserts designed for cost savings through longer tool life and more cuts per wheel. The Chopcut Titan belongs to the Chopcut family of products, designed for performance cutting on portable chop saws.

SGS Tool Co. offers its Z-Carb High Performance Rougher (HPR) line of cutting tools including Imperial and metric sizes, multiple corner radius options, and the company’s Ti-Namite-M coating. These cutters are designed to maximize tool life in hard-to-machine materials.

The line’s five-flute roughing end mills achieve high metal removal rates and a finish of 80 RMS or better on most materials, according to the company. The five-flute design delivers increased productivity compared to three- and four-flute end mills, and the variable indexing geometry is said to contribute to better chatter suppression than symmetrical designs. Providing high wear resistance, reduced friction and preventing cutting edge buildup, the Ti-Namite-M coating is engineered Shoulder Milling Inserts to support metal removal and Carbide Milling Inserts tool life for high-performance operations with difficult materials like titanium. 

March U.S. cutting tool consumption totaled $197.6 million, according to the U.S. Cutting Tool Institute (USCTI) and AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the Cutting Tool Market Report Machining Inserts (CTMR) collaboration, was up 9.8 percent surface milling cutters from February’s total and up 4.6 percent from the same time in 2014.

“As we close the first quarter of 2015, strong cutting tool shipments in March prove that this year’s economic outlook remains solid for our industry,” says Brad Lawton, chairman of AMT’s Cutting Tool Product Group. He adds that while these data support recent positive trends in machine tool orders and durable goods manufacturing, “there is a possible caution in the industry regarding the increasing value of the dollar and the potential impact on exports.”