IMCO Carbide Tool

History

IMCO Carbide Tool is a family-owned and -operated company founded in 1977 by Lawrence R. Osburn. With his wife and two sons, Perry and Matthew, Osburn built his business in general-purpose end mills, burs, routers and drills for the automotive and manufacturing industries.

The sons served as company vice presidents, until Perry succeeded his father as President in 1984, with Matthew continuing as Vice President in charge of factory set-up, production processes, hiring, training, inventory management, supplier relations and quality oversight. As the machining industry was challenged by engineered materials with difficult-to-machine characteristics and more demanding specifications and tolerances, the brothers turned their focus on developing tools to meet those challenges.

IMCO began to research and develop end mills, working with customers to create tools capable of much higher performance with new and emerging high-speed machining technologies. Versatile tools dubbed Streaker M2 end mills were introduced in 1988. Streakers were designed especially for working in aluminum. A notoriously "soft" metal, aluminum tends to meld in the intense heat of the cutting zone before the chips can be evacuated. This causes the chips to congeal in the cutting zone, requiring downtime to clear the blockage and, often, replace the tool. Tests with customer shops showed that Streakers eliminate this clogging problem.

IMCO's M7 Omega-6 end mills, introduced in 2000, were designed to resolve problems in achieving high surface finishes, especially in hard-to-machine materials. Soon thereafter, IMCO launched another new product called enDURO M5 end mills, developed especially for working in and finishing aerospace alloys (titanium, stainless steels) and high-silicon aluminum. This line includes three- and five-flute designs to accommodate varying needs for chipload, chip evacuation and finish quality.