Smart Garden Offices offer an extensive range of buildings with each one being personalised to meet each of their customers individual requirements in terms of overall dimensions and positioning in the garden after a site survey. Fully fitted interiors include the Smart Versa Desk System offering an ergonomic workspace that has been purpose designed for each one of the Smart office range, optimising internal space and providing work surfaces, shelving and cupboards, all being installed after the office has been erected.
Smart's unique manufacturing system allows them to complete 90% of the build process within their own factory, with the remaining tasks being final assembly on site. Each building is 'man portable' meaning that Smart ensure all components can be readily transportable through a house and assembled in a rear garden.
Smart Garden Offices managing director, Charlie Dalton, comments: “Due to more and more people now being able to work from home rather than have to commute long distances to their workplace, we have received a significant increase in both enquiries and orders for our garden offices, so our lead times were increasing. In order to improve our lead times and also increase capacity in our factory, I decided to investigate the installation of a CNC machining centre as I felt it would assist our machining capacity and provide greater accuracy in assembling our component parts”
“As we had no CNC experience, we knew that we required a degree of hand-holding, so we not only looked at Italian and German manufactured machines, but also the training and back-up provided in the short and long term. We approached Phil Vaux of Blyth Machinery, SCM's distributer in East Anglia, as we had previously purchased an SCM combination machine from him. He arranged demonstrations along with SCM's Roger Gabb at customers producing solid wood components.
“After much consideration, and one or two bad demonstrations with SCM's competitors, we decided to purchase the SCM CNC Machining Centre model Tech Z2 with a 5200mm long table to accommodate our 4800mm longest component.”
The inspiration behind SCM producing the TECH Z2 is that of providing the very best solution for the most dynamic woodworking, joinery and panel sectors, setting a new benchmark for those markets. The Tech Z2 is designed to produce top performance and set new standards of User-Friendliness.
The Tech Z2 is ideal for the production of customised furniture, panel machining and it can also be equipped with devices suitable for solid wood machining for the joinery market. It has a vectorial positioning speed of 83 metres/min. (X-Y axes)
High performance is due to the latest Photobumpers safety protections (a patented solution), avoiding light cells or floor mats. Also, to save valuable floor space, the electrical cabinet and pneumatics are installed within the machine base. Customisation and flexibility are due to the wide choice of equipment pre-settings, with the high performance worktable with bars and vacuum pods and the Penta function.
The work table consists of eight 1300mm TV aluminium bars with pneumatic locking after positioning along the table. Various suction cups are located along the bars to hold the components to be machined with alignment against two rows of pneumatic stops. Four pneumatic loading assistance devices help the operator to position components on the table especially if they are of large dimensions.
The mechanical fixing of the vacuum cups provides the certainty and guarantee of quality results by utilising a powerful mechanical grip that locks into position the vacuum cups instead of the widespread vacuum system. It is unrivalled when working in heavy duty conditions and unique in being free from dust (an SCM patent).
The machine's cantilever structure is unique and very easy to use. It is the only structure that allows the loading of components along the Y axis far larger than the standard working capacity of the machine which is 5200 x 1300mm.
A powerful 11kW electrospindle running up to 24000 RPM enables the Tech Z2 to machine heavy duty materials and timber without any problems. The electrospindle is fitted with a Vector Axis with Penta Digital Control which provides automatic rotation at 360° in the X-Y directions when Angular Heads are fitted.
Tooling is supplied to the electrospindle by either an R8 Rapid Tool Changer with eight tooling positions or a TR10 automatic tool changer with a capacity of 10 tools or machining heads and is located at the end of the machines table. An F18 boring head with inverter and with 12 vertical and six horizontal independent spindles and including an integrated sawblade for grooving completes the high specification.
Programming of the Tech Z2 using SCM's Group’s Xilog Maestro mwith the advantage of having simple and intuitive features and is very easy to use even for the most inexperienced operator. Various modules can be supplied. An additional key was supplied for programming in the office and a movable control panel with a PC adjacent to the machine. Automatic centralised lubrication is included.
Charlie Dalton concludes: “We are very pleased with our SCM Tech Z2 and are already experiencing the many advantages the machine provides. For example, a Quarto Base Rail that previously took 40 - 50 minutes to machine now takes only 10 minutes, so a majority of work is now going on the CNC including wall panels that are machined very fast. Lead times are gradually reducing making all our customers very happy.”
Smart Garden Offices
T 01473 833997
www.smartgardenoffices.co.uk
SCM Group (UK) Ltd
T 0115 9770044
www.scmgroup-uk.com
