Milling - Portal / Gantry milling machines(29)

Gantry or portal milling machines are large machines whose structure occupies an important space on the ground. Their particular structural composition makes them the ideal machines for machining very large pieces. When the workpiece is large, it is preferable to clamp it on a fixed workpiece holder table, in this particular case we will have a fixed table compared to a gantry structure of the machine. All movements are meant by the tool x- and z-axis stroke and of the gantry that moves along the y-axis. The head can also be given additional motions if it includes the B axis and the C axis in the case of machining workpieces with very complex geometries. Due to their very large dimensions, gantry and portal milling machines suffer a little from problems of dynamics and poor precision caused precisely by the enormous masses to be moved. Despite this limit, gantry and portal milling machines are widely used in all those industrial sectors where the large size of the pieces to be processed does not facilitate their handling. We are talking about industrial sectors such as aerospace, rail, automotive, oil and more generally heavy carpentry. In the most sophisticated versions, these machines can also be equipped with an automatic rotary table, automatic tool changer and automatic head changer system. For further information please read this article published on our blog: "How milling machine works"