Vacuum Lifting Device VacuMaster Comfort Rotates Office Furniture Panels by 180 Degrees

A good example for vacuum handling is the production of table tops for office furniture, which are cut to size using a CNC cutting machine. When they leave the pre-production process, the table tops already have a rounded protective edge, which faces downward (required due to the production process). The unfinished table tops (weighing 160 kg), which are fed into the sawing machine in a stack, must be rotated by 180 degrees before being placed onto the machine table. Apart from avoiding damage to the materials, the firm also wanted to reduce the number of personnel needed to perform this task, which had previously required at least two employees.

Here, the vacuum lifting device VacuMaster Comfort was designed to turn sheets by 180° and for weights of up to 125 kg. The Schmalz modular system allowed for precise adjustment of the lifting device to suit the handling task using two SPU suction plates attached to an aluminum beam. A sheet is 3,600 mm long, 1,000 mm wide and can weigh up to 110 kg. In order to allow the machinery to remove these sheets from the stack, turn them and place them onto the machine table, the vacuum lifting device was combined with a single-beam overhead crane system with a working area of 7 x 5 m. When used together, the easy-to-move aluminum overhead crane system and the lifting device enable a single employee to load the machine safely, easily and precisely.