Determination of the load on profiled roller guide rails used as ram guides for metal-forming machines

Abstract

Properties of profiled roller guide rails are high load capacity, high rigidity against tractive and compressive forces, low friction and high accuracy of guidance. The bearing clearance equals zero in profiled roller guide rails due to the pre-stress between carriage, rollers and guideway. For these reasons profiled roller guide rails have been used as ram guides in metal-forming machines for several years. Unlike sliding ram guides, guides with profiled roller guide rails can transmit tractive and compressive forces. Thereby the ram with its guides contributes to the stiffness of the whole machine. The load capacity of profiled roller guide rails is limited to the lifetime of the rollers. The load on the profiled roller guide rails during the production process is the main input for the calculation of the lifetime and can by now only be estimated roughly. The measuring method presented in this paper enables the determination of these loads.