Production Route

1. 1Sawing and blanking. Aluminium block is cut oversize from certified stock, faces milled flat and square, allowance left for stress movement after material removal.
2. 2Five-axis machining, the decisive step. The flange face, the tool-side register diameter, the hollow barrel and the offset reducer pad are all machined without releasing the part. Rotary table indexing reaches the pad and the side ports; linked simultaneous motion generates the blended fillets between barrel and pad. Roughing is split into a high-feed face pass and a helical barrel pass, then a semi-finish normalises wall thickness before the finish pass cuts the register, the bore and the bolt circle. Cable window edges and seal grooves are cut in the same cycle so they stay concentric with the barrel.
3. 3Edge finishing and wash. Burrs removed at the cable window and seal groove, thread flutes cleaned, ultrasonic degreasing and DI-water rinse.
4. 4Optional surface work. Bead blasting for a satin grain, clear or black anodizing for corrosion protection, or hard anodizing on the flange face where the gripper clamps repeatedly.
5. 5Inspection and release. CMM checks flange perpendicularity, bore roundness, pad position and bolt circle; thread gauges, seal-groove width and finish thickness are recorded before packing.

Where the Process Gets Hard

The barrel wall between the cable window and the flange is the weak point: removing that window leaves an interrupted, unsupported shell that deflects under side milling force, and the flange face then springs out of flat after the part is released from the fixture. We pre-machine the window in the roughing stage rather than after finishing, support the barrel with an expanding mandrel, keep axial depth light and constant around the window, and add a stress-relief pause before the finish pass. The result is a flange that stays within 0.02 mm flatness and a bore that stays round within 0.01 mm after clamping is released.

Typical Installations

• Cobot wrist output flange - gripper and tool mounting on 6-axis collaborative arms
• Industrial arm end housing - light six-axis manipulators in handling and palletising cells
• Vision inspection heads - camera tilt and pan mounts on automated optical inspection stations
• Medical handling units - light payload end effectors in laboratory automation
• Warehouse robotics - vacuum and mechanical gripper mounts on picking shuttles
• Research platforms - modular wrist interfaces for teaching and laboratory robot arms

Design Highlights

Specifications

Ordering Information

Provide a 3D model with the flange standard you use, the payload rating, the cable bundle diameter and the required anodizing colour. We quote sampling and series price separately, machine the first article for your fit check, and keep the program and fixture on file so repeat orders run without a new setup. Both prototype quantities and monthly series batches are handled in the same shop.