ESORO has developed two testing facilities by order of the company FRÄNKISCHE Cable Management AG in Mönchaltorf Switzerland. The flexibility- and the alternate bending check meet the standard of DIN EN 61386-23 (flexible conduit systems) and further directives of the customer. Testable are different corrugated tubes with a nominal diameter from 7mm to 48mm. This wide testing range is achieved with adjustable bend radius and various test pulleys.
The first testing facility, the flexibility check, has a vacuum system to monitor the samples. The start of a crack in the tube is triggered very accurate. Thereby, up to four samples are monitored individually. To simulate low temperature environment down to -45°C the facilities has been delivered together with a Bender climatic chamber. The test cycle speed of the dynamic stepper motor is smoothly adjustable, up to 50 cycles per minute.
At the alternate bending check, the tube-samples are loaded with different weights. It has the goal to determine the maximum number of bending cycles. When a sample starts to crack, the actual cycles counted is saved in the controller. The speed of the facility is smoothly adjustable up to 100 cycles per minute with a stroke of 800mm.
The development of the facilities as well as the electromechanical design was realized by ESORO to the full extend. This includes the software development of the machine controller too. Both facilities are provided with safety elements such as a monitored access doors, emergency switches and a temperature monitoring of the test area and the climatic chamber.
