T.h.t. Presses, Inc.

Ted H Thieman

Richard J Kamm

A vertical frame supports a rotary indexing table which carries a pair of vertical shot sleeves each having a shot piston with a depending shot piston rod. The shot sleeves are alternately indexed between a metal receiving station and a metal transfer station where a mold is supported above the table by a gate plate mounted on the frame. A hydraulic ejection cylinder and a substantially larger hydraulic shot cylinder are supported by the frame under the metal receiving and transfer stations, respectively, and laterally sliding couplings alternately connect the shot piston rods to the hydraulic cylinders when the table is indexed 180.degree.. Each shot piston and the gate plate form a biscuit which is retracted into the shot sleeve at the transfer station by the shot cylinder and is ejected at the receiving station by the ejection cylinder after the table and shot sleeves are indexed.

Vertical die casting press with indexing shot sleeves

A vertical die casting press includes a frame supporting a stationary lower horizontal platen which supports a base plate attached to a lower mold. An upper horizontal platen is supported for vertical movement between vertical columns by corner lift cylinders mounted on the lower platen, and the upper platen encloses hydraulic cylinders for actuating blades for releasably locking the upper platen to teeth on the vertical columns at a selected height. The upper platen carries a relatively movable intermediate platen which supports a base plate attached to an upper mold. After the upper platen is locked to the columns, a hydraulic load cell or cylinder within the upper platen clamps the intermediate platen and upper mold to the lower mold and lower platen. Molten die cast material is transferred through a horizontal ceramic cylinder from a ladle inlet to a vertical shot cylinder within the lower platen and lower mold, and a shot piston injects the material upwardly from the shot cylinder through runners and into cavities defined by the molds. The intermediate platen and lower platen enclose hydraulic cylinders for extending and retracting a set of rollers which engage tracks within the corresponding base plates to provide for quickly removing and replacing a set of upper and lower molds and corresponding base plates.

Vertical die casting press and method of operation

An ingot having a predetermined amount of electrolytic copper and a small percentage of boron copper alloy is rapidly heated to about 2,100.degree. F. in a clay graphite crucible by induction coils surrounding the crucible. The crucible and the entire amount of molten copper are automatically transferred to a cavity defined within a shot cylinder above a vertically movable shot piston of a vertical die casting press. A shuttle moves a lower end ring mold and a stack of connected rotor laminations into a position above the shot cylinder, and the press moves an upper end ring mold downwardly to clamp the stack between the molds and against the cylinder. The molten copper is rapidly injected upwardly through gates within the lower mold and into end ring cavities within the molds and also through connecting aligned bar slots within the stack of laminations with a shot pressure of about 2250 psi. After the copper solidifies by circulating cooling water within the molds, the press opens and the die cast rotor and lower mold are transferred by the shuttle to a position where the rotor is ejected upwardly from the lower mold by a fluid cylinder. The copper rotor is annealed by induction heating the rotor to about 1,500.degree. F. and allowed to air cool.

Growing community of inventors

Dayton, OH, United States of America

Ted H Thieman