Matching precision ball screw performance with tight budgets

The key to a long operational life of any product is correctly ensuring that the components capability is within the design requirements. When it comes to precision ball screws, the experts at Abssac are adept at transferring great product knowledge to achieve customer goals.

The saying, “the bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten” is an excellent anecdote. However, sometimes a medium can be found. Abssac recently supplied a pharmaceutical analysis manufacturer, whose goal was to achieve a low unit cost system, but deliver very high positional accuracy. Often these two factors are poles apart, but selecting best tolerance precision rolled ball screw stock, as opposed to a ground screw format, provided an instant cost saving of around 25-30%.

The application was to drive a precision guillotine within an electronic microscope. Fine slithers of test material are cut off in rapid succession requiring a high degree of repeatable accuracy, in quick succession.

Using a miniature rolled ball screw (MRB) model with a 1.00mm lead and then matching ultra-high spherically toleranced ball bearings within the ball nut, reduced backlash within the bearing system to an absolute minimum. The matched paired ball nut and screws were then performance and delivered the linear repeatability guarantees that were required, within budget.