E-Sharp News July 2020

Based in the southern Poland village of Mazańcowice, N-Pol Cutting Tools is a family-owned company that started with local production and sales before venturing into exports seven years ago. Today, the company sells tools on every continent – both standard and special tools that are made upon customer requests.  

Agnieszka Białek, General Manager, said: “N-Pol produce woodworking tools, we produce from solid carbide, we produce rotors and profile knives. I think that it’s about 60% of our production. Some years ago, we also started production for Alu Plus and Plex materials, and from 6 years, we also produce tools for the composite market.”

“We use solid carbide rods [from] certificated European producers. Thanks to the quality of rods, we have less problems with production and we give our clients good quality. Thanks to the different sorts of carbide, you have long life tools.”
 
Poland is one of the biggest production markets in the furniture and woodworking industry, which was very important to N-Pol in the initial years of producing locally. As the company has grown, so has the capacity for production – resulting in their decision to produce the same tools for export seven years ago.

“We have very good technical knowledge because we have been in the market for 25 years. We started from service, after we start with production of tools, so we have very good knowledge and huge experience,” Agnieszka said.

The right machines and software for the right job
 
Krzysztof Noga, owner at N-Pol, said: “We bought our first ANCA machine six years ago, and we see that ANCA is for us, a better solution for production. Every ANCA machine has an automatic robot, and we practically use it for production 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.”

While production of special tools is conducted during the day due to the need for supervision, the company has employed a lights-out approach for production of standard tools while relying on ANCA’s Management Suite, which enables customers to monitor the operational performance of their machines and provide live production and machine data to make informed operational improvements. Although N-Pol is currently testing the software, they are confident that it will bring many benefits as it allows them to respond quickly to any potential problems that might occur during the overnight production.

Krzysztof said: “ANCA machines have very good software for us. We can make a new tool, we can change everything. For us, software from ANCA is a very good option.”

“Our first machine was a GX7, it is the standard model machine. Every machine we have bought since has the linear motors. We see the difference between a standard machine and a newer model with linear motors. It is a very stable machine. The last machine we bought from ANCA is with a LaserPlus, and we show now, laser is working very good. It is a very big step in quality.”

According to Agnieszka, the Auto-Stick, the automatic wheel-conditioning system for ANCA tool grinders, “is very good because during production, the wheels use it and we can clean and produce without any problems, and everything is within tolerance.”

The Pop-Up Steady, which gives additional support to the tool during grinding operations, is another must-have accessory that allows for a very high quality of production. “We maintain the dimensions on the tool and we have productions without any vibration,” Agnieszka said.

Staying one step ahead with technology

“We are, every time, one step ahead with new technology. It is very important – when we have good technology [and a] good machine, we can give our customers new products,” Krzysztof said.

Agnieszka agrees that the future of tool production is bright for N-Pol, concluding that “N-Pol is an example of a company which never stopped, which invests lots of money for the future. It is also very good quality of tools. I’m never afraid to recommend our tools because you can compare our production with the bigger producers and brands.”
 

8 July 2020