High Speed Machining, or better yet High Velocity Machining is often chosen especially for new investments in manufacturing, at least when machining non-ferrous metals. This makes sense given the progress in machine spindle technology and the velocity with which the machine axes can travel.
This in conjunction with advanced cutting material, particularly polycrystalline diamonds, substantially reduces main machining and non-production time.
Different is the situation when machining ferrous metal. Cast iron, Carbon and allow steels as well as super alloys; all have their specific characteristics making it difficult to apply real high cutting speeds.
Since it is either technologically not feasible and/or impractical because of an unfavorable price/performance ratio to apply cutting speeds close to those applicable for non-ferrous metals, other avenues have to be taken.
Besides the cutting speed, attention has to be paid to minimizing machining time and optimizing the entire machining process. This is what is called “High Performance Machining (HPM)”.
HPM does not necessarily require the acquisition of new machinery; the efforts go toward improving upon existing processes. The most promising and intriguing part of the process is the cutting tools systems, for they can easiest be adapted to specific applications. Furthermore, when the application drives the process it is the new cutting tool system that mostly determines the level of machining and manufacturing performance.