IFH Group West Installs New Laser-Punch System

IFH Group West, LLC (Arlington, WA) has increased their production capabilities by installing a Prima LPe6f 4 kW fiber laser cutting system integrated with a 61-station, 30 ton servo-electric turret punch press. By replacing a standalone laser cutting system and three metal punches, this new system has already been shown to reduce project setup times while increasing shop capacity and technical capabilities.

This shop fabricates an array of custom electrical enclosures and precision sheet metal parts as a subsidiary of IFH Group (Rock Falls, IL), the originator of industrial fluid storage and handling systems and a leading fabricator of custom hydraulic reservoirs and fuel tanks. “This laser/punch is a significant improvement to our manufacturing process,” said Ryan McCarty, the vice president of sales and marketing at IFH. “With this in place, we can now deliver prototypes and one-off or two-off projects with very quick turnaround that is much shorter than a typical three- or four-week lead time.”

The Prima LPe6f uses a 4 kW IPG fiber laser and can process 60 in x 120 in sheet material up to 0.315 in thick. The turret features an up-forming station for processing high formed features and can cut 16 ga (0.0598 in thick) mild steel at approximately 590 ipm. The servo electric punch press can hit 1,000 spm. Connected to the fiber laser is a new LSR (Loading and Stacking Robot) that retrieves and stacks parts on a pallet and loads new sheets into the machine for processing. Attached to the LSR is a two-sided combo tower that holds raw sheet metal, parts and material skeletons. It is currently outfitted with 21 shelves, each having a capacity of 6,600 lb or 100 mm (3.937 in) of material.

www.ifhgroup.com