Bar Feeders For Plumbing Supplies
If you’re trying to maximize lathe productivity, bar feeders are necessary. By eliminating delays for material loading, bar feeders let your lathes spend more time cutting and less time being loaded or waiting for loading.
Businesses making parts for plumbing fixtures and fittings turn a lot of cylindrical shapes from bronze and brass. Here’s why you should consider bar feeders for plumbing supplies.
Machining Plumbing Supplies
Pipes and hoses need couplings, unions, barbs and end caps. These are turned from bar stock in materials from brass to stainless steel. The faster they come off your lathes, the better the margin on them. Adding a bar feeder to a lathe eliminates manual handling. Part off one lock nut or nipple, feed a length of bar through the headstock, and machine the next one.
IEMCA’s used and new bar feed systems for the plumbing industry are fast and reliable. They handle all the materials required, from bronze to galvanized steel, and in round and hexagonal sections. Load one with tube and you have a pipe manufacturing machine.
Doosan Lynx 220LM and IEMCA Boss 552
Benefits of Bar Feeders for Plumbing Supplies
Turned parts such as hose nipples, end caps and valve spindles are excellent candidates for bar feeders. Machining time per piece is low, which makes hand loading a significant expense. In contrast, as these parts are (mostly) short, one 12-foot bar yields a large quantity of pieces.
By machining plumbing supplies on a bar feeder-equipped lathe, manufacturers see:
- Less labor needed for part loading
- Higher machine utilization
- Increased material utilization (stock in the chuck or collet is fed forward to become the next part)
The benefits these improvements bring include:
- Increased turning capacity - take on more work, reduce overtime working or use the space for something else
- Lower labor cost per piece as one worker can oversee multiple lathes
- Lower material cost per piece
Can a Bar Feed-Equipped Lathe Turn Pipe?
Yes! If you’re in the business of pipe manufacturing, bar feeder machines can hold and feed pipe through the headstock. This enables threading or any other turning operation.
Nakamura Super NJT and IEMCA Maestro 80
Why Come to IEMCA for Bar Feeders?
As inventors of the automatic bar feed machine, we have a history of making bar feeder systems for the plumbing industry. Backed by a workforce of 500, our machines are hard at work in manufacturing operations around the world. Companies choose IEMCA’s new and used bar feeders to machine plumbing supplies because of their:
- Reliability
- Durability
- Ability to handle a wide range of bar stock materials and sizes
IEMCA bar feeders are available for bars up to 20 feet long and for diameters from 0.8 millimeters to 100 millimeters — larger if necessary. They are compatible with lathes from all leading manufacturers and backed by our global support network. Use our bar feeder search tool to find the one that works best for you and contact us today.