Oh yer, please post more you know I like this stuff!!! In the first photo are those 4 big arse worm screws that clamp the tool together?
Yeah - they are the tie-bars, there are half-nuts on the far side of the moving platen. (Hidden in the pic)
The tool closes, half nuts engage - then the tie bars are pulled to the right by hydraulic cylinders to clamp. The tie bars can move about 25mm total. It makes the machine shorter as you don't have the massive clamp cylinder at the left hand end of the machine. There a 4 cylinders about 500mm long attached to the RHS fixed platen. You can see them in the long shot of the machine - near the end of the barrel.
Most of the new Engle's use this system now. No farting around with mold height etc - it's all automatic. Plus the back of the platen is open and accessible - I actually store the ejector couplings behind there (Inside the machine).
Traditional hydraulic machines have a big clamp cylinder at the left hand end - this sits on a rack system that allows you to drive the whole assembly left or right, this sets the height of the tool. (And jams the tool shut when you screw it up!) - the other machine I use is like this - will stand on top of it and get a pic to show what I mean.
That vac former at work is used to prototype headlight lenses BTW - still haven't walked over there and had a look! (It's across the street in another building)
I have 75gig of photos scattered over 4 pc's - I am missing (can't find) a lot of stuff I thought I had! No stress - will get shutter happy this week!
