With the popularity of CNC machining，more and more automation equipment is emerging in the market. Nowadays, many conventional machine tools in factories are replaced by CNC machine tools.Many people speculate that conventional lathes will be completely eliminated in the near future.
Is this true?
Machine tools have been developed for hundreds of years. In such a period of continuous development, some machine tools have been eliminated by the times. However, until today, there are still some conventional machine tools in many factories that continue to shine. The main reasons why these factories did not replace them with CNC machines are as follows:
1. Conventional machine tools are more affordable
For enterprises, it’s extremely important to control production costs. Especially for lathes, the purchase cost of CNC lathes is several times more expensive than that of conventional lathe with the same power, and the later maintenance, repair, supporting consumables and other costs are also much higher than it. Although CNC machine tools are being used more and more, the advantages of conventional machine tools still can’t be replaced, so conventional lathe machine may not be completely replaced in the short term.
2. More suitable for small-scale machining
The advantages of conventional machine tools are shown when only small batches of workpieces need to be machining. Most skilled workers can machine the part with conventional machine tools with drawings of parts.
Nowadays, machine tool users like the word “customization” more. So this also puts forward higher requirements for machine tool manufacturers. Most of the time, workers need to make secondary modifications to the part of workpiece which is customized. It would be a waste of time and energy to use the CNC machine to program at this time. Many masters directly carry out simple processing. Through conventional machine tools, the parts can be used. This is one of the important reasons why many manufacturers keep conventional machine tools.
3. High salaries of CNC programmers and few talents
Compared with automated equipment or even laser equipment, the advantages of conventional machine tools that only require manual operation are embraced by many workers. Not every worker has the ability to program. CNC programmers often require higher salaries, and there are many types of CNC systems. It is obviously more difficult to find an operator who is proficient in CNC machine tools than a conventional machine tool worker.
4. About business input costs
Although CNC machine tools are becoming more and more popular in factories. Investing lots of money by one time to replace equipment in batches will put large pressure on enterprises. Considering the capital turnover of enterprises and the rational use of equipment, most enterprises will choose to gradually replace the numerical control equipment, so many enterprises keep manufacturing by conventional machine tools.
All in all, although CNC manufacturing has become a major trend in the development of the manufacturing industry, conventional machine tools still have their own unique advantages in the case of the popularization of intelligent equipment. With the continuous improvement of the intelligence of CNC machine tools in the future, traditional machine tools may be replaced on a large scale, but it is not feasible to completely eliminate them.
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