An insider's view of Abssac's precision linear products

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Abssac is an established supplier of lead screws, ball screws and satellite roller screws, including support bearings and other related ancillary products. The company's engineers have expertise in assisting customers to specify the correct linear products for their applications, while a fast turnaround machine shop supplies linear products ready to fit directly into an application, thereby reducing customer scrap rates.

Ground ball screws

Ball screws that have been formed by a grinding process are used where linear accuracy is paramount within an application. Abssac offers a high-quality range of metric threaded screws, with a variety of standard and bespoke ball nut designs to suit any application.

Diameters ranging from 1.8mm to 16mm and leads of 0.5mm to 30mm are available with a choice of accuracies from C0 to C5. All of Abssac's ground ball screws can be supplied cut to length, with end journals machined ready to fit into the customer's application.

Rolled ball screws

Ball screws that have been formed by cold rolling are suitable for applications that do not require the finite accuracy of the ground ball screw equivalents, but are still required to reliably transmit a linear load with a high degree of repeatable accuracy. Utilising a wide range of ball nut designs, diameters from 4mm to 80mm and leads of 1mm to 50mm are available with accuracies of C7 to C10. All rolled ball screws can be supplied cut to length, with end journals machined ready to fit into an application.

Transport ball screws

Abssac offers an industrial ball screw range that effectively converts high-torque rotary input into precise high-load linear movement. All industrial ball screws can be delivered cut to length and, if required, machined ready to fit into the required support bearing mounts. Utilising the recirculating ball bearing nut technology as the base of the product, the industrial class ball screws encompass screw diameters from 12mm up to 80mm as standard with C7 accuracy. Leads of 1mm to 50mm are available through a large range of ball nut designs which, in many cases, utilise multiple ball circuits to achieve greater load capacities.

Lead screws

Abssac is not only able to supply standard ranges of rolled thread forms and nuts, but can also develop special types of thread forms that meet customers' exact requirement. Utilising screw diameters from 2mm to 150mm and leads from 0.25mm to 200mm, Abssac's engineering staff can provide important ideas to optimise the design phase or refurbishment of an end product, in both screw form and nut design. From miniature to power products, the lead screw ranges are a truly formidable package in the world of linear movement.

Nuts and flanges

The nut in any lead screw application is essentially a device that constrains relative motion to a desired motion, and does so with minimal friction between the moving parts. Therefore the match between the screw thread and the nut thread is critical and Abssac only supplies lead screw and nut threads that are matched to give optimum performance.

Abssac has standard nut designs to suit most linear applications but, when a nut design requires additional attachment or function, the company's linear engineers can also help to find a solution. Primarily using Delrin as a base material for the plastic nuts, the acetyl resin engineering plastic is often used as a metal substitute. Other nut and flange designs are supplied using aluminium, phosphor bronze, steel and other engineering plastics.

Satellite roller screws

Instead of using ball bearings, a satellite roller screw employs matched rollers to rotate (or satellite, as the product name suggests) around the screw thread during actuation. The admissible static and dynamic load capacities are therefore considerably higher than that of a ball screw of the same diameter. In fact the static load can be three times greater than that of ball screws and, as a consequence, their lifespan can be up to 15 times longer. As standard, satellite screws can be supplied with outside diameters as small as 10mm and up to 200mm. Leads can be as fine as 0.25mm. The satellite roller screw is therefore primarily chosen as part of a transition within a new or existing design to achieve greater load capacity and greater linear positional accuracy in the smallest envelope space.

Self reversing screws

With the self-reversing screw product, only one direction of rotation is required of the screw to achieve reciprocating bidirectional linear movement of the nut. The movement is achieved by using a follower blade in the nut that is matched to the groove width and screw turn round on the screw.

There is not a standard range of this screw type as all designs are manufactured to meet the customer's individual specification. However, they can be created in just about any mild steel, stainless steel, bronze or aluminium. The nut can be supplied in a style and size to suit customers' requirements.

Linear guides and rails

Concentrating on the flanged mount and square mount versions of linear guides has proven to be the best linear guide solution when teamed up with any of Abssac's ball and lead screw products. Primarily using a four-ball path design within the slide allows the guides to accept up to 30 per cent more load and be up to 30 per cent stiffer than similar products in the market. The designs have the ball bearings retained within the housing so that, should the guides come off the end of the rail, the customer will not be faced with the ball bearings falling out. This advantage can also significantly aid in the final assembly.

Support bearings

Precision thrust and radial bearing units are stocked and have proven to be an ideal partner for Abssac's range of lead, ball, satellite roller and self-reversing screws. The complete thrust bearing kits contain the bearing housing, bearing set, cover, spacer, seal, locknut and set screw. Investing in large stocks gives Abssac the advantage of supplying, at very competitive prices, pillow block and flange-mounted bearing types that are interchangeable with leading brands. These are available in both flanged and pillow block versions catering for shaft sizes from 2mm up to 40mm.

Splined shafts

Machined from high-grade EN8 steel in diameters of 14mm to 54mm as standard, and in lengths up to 3m, splined shafts can be used in a wide variety of high-load and long-life-expectancy linear applications. The splined shafts are complemented by a range of matched phosphor bronze flange nuts.

As standard, splined shaft are available in 14mm to 54mm diameter with either six or eight splines. A full range of flanged steel or bronze sleeves is available to complement the splines. Standard lengths of 250, 500, 1000, 2000 and 3000mm are available from stock.

End machining

Supplying ball and lead screws ready to fit into applications often requires Abssac to supply product to a customer drawing and specification. Employing turning, grinding, milling and straightening techniques optimises the final product. Reverse engineering projects are also welcomed.

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