September 2007 Edition

KEYSEATING

The Key to Keyseating

Cutting keys was a losing proposition until a shop owner invented a better "mousetrap." The new system brought in work and may have the world beating a path to his door.

Sometimes there' s so little profit in a job the only sensible thing to do is turn the work away. Kim Morris, founder of Morris Welding & Machine, Inc., Wildwood, FL, found himself doing that when faced with work that required keyseating.

"It was a constant fight to cut keys, and tooling was very expensive," Morris said. " Cutting keys was a losing situation using standard methods because each key length demanded a unique seat. For a 3" key,
we' d have to make a specific seat that couldn' t be used for any other length. We turned down a lot of work because they had keys.

"It would cost so much in labor or subcontracting the keyseating work that it took all of the profit out of the job so that we turned down the work."

Morris knew turning down work wasn't the way to make the business he started in 1974, succeed. He had to find a better way to cut keys that wouldn't take the profit out of the job. What he did was invent the MorrisKeyseater, a portable unit designed to mount on any mill – manual or CNC – and efficiently cut keys.

It took about seven months of intensive work to develop the new system, but when finished, it proved not only faster, but more capable as well, more than 20 times more capable.

Cutting Keyways and Time

"Cutting keys on our Davis No. 4 keyseater took up to 20 minutes per cut," Jason Morris, Kim's son, said.

With the keyseater invented by his father, the shop now cuts the same type of key in a minute. It further saves time, money, and effort because it sidesteps many of the drawbacks of traditional keyseating, such as setups and other problems inherent in traditional methods.

The scrubbing action of a standard keyseater broach heats the workpiece, causing it to workharden. The harder the broach is pushed, the greater the friction and the faster the hardening. The hardening dulls the broach.

"It's a Catch-22," Kim said.

For Morris Welding, changing a broach ate shop time and the cost of a new one could be as much as $300; both lost time and new tool costs made work with traditional keyseaters unprofitable.

"We turned down work that required cutting internal keys," Kim said.

But, not anymore. With the development of the CNC-controlled keyseater, Morris Welding – MWI – has the capability to do more jobs.

"We once turned away work that required splines," Kim said. "Spline cutting was an expensive capability to add, but with the new system we're doing work that requires both internal and external splines. That kind of work wasn't available to us as a small shop. Although we call it the MorrisKeyseater, it does much more than keys. We've incorporated spline work and do a lot more high-end work."

Kim and Jason soon saw that the keyseater system was marketable as well. They patented the system in the first part of 2007 and have been developing a customer base since then.

Shop Evolution

When MWI began, more than three decades ago, it was a welding and fabricating shop catering to customers in the automotive and wood industries. As the business grew, Kim moved the focus of MWI from fabricating to machining. In 1997, he saw the advantage of CNC controls over traditional machining and purchased a Milltronics VM 30 Mill. The addition of four other Milltronics machines followed. A Daewo Puma 240 production lathe coupled with a SMW Spacesaver 2200 bar feeder was a recent addition to the 7,500 ft² shop.

The company, a family-owned business with six employees, creates prototypes, custom machine parts, and production runs for a local tier-one automotive supplier. But, the Morrises see the keyseater system as a important component in their future business.

They showed the keyseater at EASTEC 2007 and found it turned heads. A web presence [www.morriskeyseater.com] also generated a lot of interest. The father and son team are working with several distributors and are seeking distributors across the country.

The MorrisKeyseater fits manual or CNC mills. It cuts internal and external keys, splines, tapered keys, internal grooves, blind keys, and helicols. The machine is driven by the mill's spindle, and the base is clamped directly to the mill's table. The machine cuts along the X- and Z-axes.

It uses live water-cooled tooling. Tooling can be changed in less than 30 seconds with an Allen wrench. A single spindle cuts different diameters, and keys can be cut without cutting the full length of the part. Tooling for the system is about 33 percent less than that of traditional broaches. Larger endmills can be sharpened and reused. The machine can be loaded and unloaded by sliding the machine's base on or off the mill's bed.

The advantages it offers over broach keyseating include:

• cutting keys in one, or multiple passes;
• changing tooling in less than one minute;
• reducing labor compared to traditional keyseaters or broaches; and
• decreasing setup time.

The MorrisKeyseater creates internal and external keyways, splines, gears, blind holes, oil ring grooves; tapered keyways, and step keys.

It uses eight 32mm linear bearings; is constructed of 1" 6061 Aluminum; is customizable to customer's requirements; is equipped with a 1,200 lb air clamp adjustable for quick change of parts, and has a direct link to the mill's coolant.

"Another feature we love is that when 7/8" endmill gets dull, we can resharpen it down to the next size and use it on another job," Jason said.

The standard model cuts keys up to 1", with a follow-on model designed for cutting keys up to 2". The standard model retails for $11,950.

MWI has been using Kim's invention since the beginning of 2007 and found it has not only provided an efficient alternative to the key cutting the company used in the past, but has given the firm an advantage over its competition and garnered work it once turned away.

Kim said, "I don't use it everyday, but when I do, I'm making money rather than losing money. The machine has opened doors to all kinds of work that I wouldn't even think of bidding on before." Morris Welding & Machining.

Visit www.rsleads.com/709mn-201 for more information.

What do you think?
Will the information in this article increase efficiency or save time, money, or effort? Let us know by e-mail from our website at www.ModernApplicationsNews.com or e-mail the editor at pnofel@nelsonpub.com.