This news article was originally written in Spanish. It has been automatically translated for your convenience. Reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate translation, however, no automated translation is perfect nor is it intended to replace a human translator. The original article in Spanish can be viewed at La tecnología Renishaw contribuye al éxito de un campeón olímpico

Renishaw technology contributes to the success of an Olympic champion

Drafting MU29/11/2007

During his Olympic reign, Sandra Kiriasis, bobsleigh in women's doubles champion, asked that they were manufactured a cutter that conform to the new regulations of the sport, and the leading company in the field of metrology, Renishaw, accepted the challenge. In collaboration with other specialist manufacturers, Siemens, Sescoi and Iscar, Renishaw employed its most modern measurement technology, including the revolutionary head of measurement Revo for coordinate measuring machines, to create a solution of blades which allowed Kiriasis dominate the season 2006-2007 of the FIBTwinning the World Cup and the World Championships.

After his landslide victory in the women's World Championships of the FIBT Bobsleigh, where in the company of the brakeman Romy Logsch, Kiriasis won the Gold Medal with an advantage of more than two seconds and explained to the commentators on TV in St. Moritz: "the blades have been the key to my success". This achievement and recognition of the contribution to the success of the various partners manufacturers, highlighted the impact of engineering technologies can have on sports competitions of speed at the highest level, which has led to the team of Kiriasis to Renishaw to sign a formal partnership agreement which runs until the end of the season 2007-2008 of the FIBT.

Rainer Lotz, managing director of Renishaw GmbH, says: "Renishaw already is actively contributing to technical solutions in the international world of the engine, as the F1 and Nascar races, both in the manufacture of engines on board the vehicle monitoring systems"Therefore, we are aware of the minimum margins between success and failure in the international top-class sports. "We are delighted to contribute with our experience to the project of blades of Kiriasis team and will strive to help continue succeeding Sandra."

The blades project grew out of the new rules introduced by the FIBT (International Bobsleigh and Toboganning Federation) in October 2006, in order to put an end to the continuing disputes on different materials and treatments used in the manufacture of blades. All bobsleigh teams should now use steel of the same specification, whereas is only allowed to innovate in the form of the blades. Kiriasis was satisfied with the performance of the used blades, but as they had been manufactured by means of manual techniques, did not have maps or digital data CAD that allow return to manufacture steel in standard specification.

After the request for assistance from Kiriasis team, announced in a metallurgical publication of Germany, several companies offered their services, but the strength of the presentation of the partnership between Siemens, Renishaw, Sescoi and Iscar facilitated the selection.

Existing blades were sent first to the facilities of Renishaw in the UK, where the revolutionary head of measurement of five axes for Revo MMC was used to inspect the blade, quickly capturing thousands of data points that would define his way with maximum detail. Unlike traditional methods of exploration, which depend on the acceleration of the three axes of the MMC to explore at high speed, Revo uses synchronized motion of the head and the machine and to reduce to a minimum the dynamic errors of motion of the MMC at very high speeds of exploration. In this way you get an inspection of high accuracy at speeds of exploration of up to 500 mm/s.

After capturing data, IGES and DXF files were created and were sent electronically to Sescoi, which conducted a CAD/CAM program for the machine control Siemens Sinumerik installed in machining center DMG installed in the workshops of the manufacturer of Iscar tools. After manufacture, the final shape of the blades was discussed with the probe of OMP400 inspection of Renishaw, a detection system of effort which allows high precision measurement on machine.