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Shaping The Future Of Furniture: Creative Homes Improves Efficiency & Quality With Leitz
Read on to learn how technical support, tooling recommendations and dedicated tooling solutions improved the efficiency and quality of Creative Homes’ furniture production...
Creative Homes Scotland is a five star rated furniture company based in Glenrothes, Fife. The company designs, manufactures and installs high quality and bespoke furniture across Scotland. Creative Homes has been working closely with its key supplier, Leitz Tooling, to develop the business, streamline manufacturing and ensure top quality products. Alan Goodsir, the companies owner and director, has developed a close relationship with Leitz over the last 3 years.
Creative Homes recently started their manufacturing journey. They are a new player to the industry and Leitz was able to offer meaningful recommendations and setup support that helped the business to get started. “Steven from Leitz offered us valuable tooling advice and he worked closely with our machinery supplier to get us set up with the correct tooling, including recommendations on cutting speeds and RPM’s. Leitz also introduced us to a system to avoid downtime and ensure there is always a tool on the machine, one ready for use and another tool off for sharpening. We don’t have to worry about the tooling side of the business anymore.” Alan noted.
Once Alan had setup his machine shop and processes, Leitz continued to support Creative Homes by offering innovative tooling solutions to address challenges in production as they arose. As part of their kitchen offering, Creative Homes manufacture kitchen surface tops with Krion® solid surface. Like many solid surface materials, Krion® can be difficult to machine due to its composition and properties. Its non-porous nature can cause excessive heat build-up when machining which can lead to melting of the material, excessive tool wear and chatter or burn marks. To solve this challenge, Leitz Tooling introduced Creative Homes to the BrillianceCut sawblade.
Featuring a pioneering tooth geometry, the BrillianceCut saw blade achieves excellent cutting results even in polymer-bound mineral materials such as Krion®. The tooth geometry ensures finish cut quality and breakout free cutting, even on tough materials. Alan commented that “The new blades cut through material like butter, with much less wastage and no chipping. Doing it right the first time has been invaluable”. Higher quality finishes lead to huge cost and time savings through eliminating rework. With up to 20 sharpens, the BrillianceCut saw blade offers a sustainable and very economical solution to solid surface and plastic sawing.
After noticing an increase in tool wear, breakage and damage; Leitz recommended that Alan swap from using Leitz UK-made carbide spiral router cutters to the Diamaster Pro3 diamond nesting router. This led to a large increase In efficiency thanks to the fast cutting speeds of the Leitz Diamaster. Thanks to the Real Z3 design, it cuts up to 50% faster than standard diamond routers, allowing for reduced cycle times. “Introducing the Leitz PCD routers on our CNC has had a positive impact on quality thanks to greatly reduced chipping. The finish quality also means we get better cuts when edgebanding.” Additionally, the Diamaster’s long tool life reduces downtime from tool changes and has resulted in a massive decrease in sharpening costs as they can be sharpened multiple times and used for longer. “Leitz are the best in the business and the support given is above everyone else. Even setting expectations on tool life”. The Diamaster router cutter also features gullets in the tool body to support efficient chip extraction and avoid resin build up on the cutting edge.
To improve the efficiency and tool life even further, Creative Homes mount their Diamaster router cutters in the ThermoGrip heat shrink chuck. The ThermoGrip clamping system combines the tool and chuck into one tool body through thermal shrinking. It plays a decisive yet often overlooked role in the machining process as it’s stress resistant body can help achieve up to 50% higher feed rates compared to collet chucks. With a 6 fold higher clamping force than conventional collet chucks, the ThermoGrip’s perfectly balanced geometry reduces vibrations, noise and therefore tool wear. This vibration reducing technology extends the life of mounted tools by up to 3 times and supports fast RPM’s of up to 36,000 min-1 for high performance cutting, faster than most machinery. Leitz measures tooling to 3 decimal points for height and diameter. This accuracy assists setting up and to aid the tool life, test cuts are not required. The small “nose” of the ThermoGrip chuck supports efficient extraction and chip removal.
Creative Homes has also benefited from the Leitz tool service programme. The sharpening service has also addressed many manufacturing challenges faced in the factory and ensures Creative Homes’ tooling is cost-effective and operating at maximum performance. The sharpening service extends tool life whilst improving cutting performance, making tooling more efficient and sustainable. This helps Creative Homes to maintain reliable cycle times and a consistent finish quality Leitz has 8 service centres in key locations across the UK for tool sharpening and repair. With a growing range of advanced machinery and the UK’s most sophisticated saw sharpening setup to date; Leitz is uniquely positioned to support Creative Homes as a sole supplier. Leitz sharpening services are accurate to microns and the intricate sharpening process revitalises tools so that they perform at their best, offering a consistent finish quality.
Overall, support from Leitz has enabled Creative Homes to stay focused on what they do best: manufacturing high quality kitchens, bedrooms and bathrooms. Creative Homes Scotland has experienced a significant transformation thanks to its strategic partnership with Leitz Tooling. By leveraging Leitz's innovative tooling solutions and expert sharpening services, Creative Homes has streamlined its manufacturing processes, reduced costs, and enhanced the quality of its bespoke furniture. “Leitz are the best at what they do, that’s why we have developed a great working relationship.”
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