From software to smart wiring, the tools of e-manufacturing are increasingly applied to integrate, streamline, and remold today's industrial enterprise.
Data For All
In the mid-1990s, Kollsman managed engineering design data manually with paper and microfiche. The company was using a homegrown data management system, but the solution became unworkable with an upgrade to the Oracle Manufacturing ERP system and Y2K system updates.
"At that point, we were stuck with no vaulting system for our CAD models," recalls Gregg Wilder, Kollsman design engineering manager. "We couldn't be 100% sure that our data was accurate. . . . Plus, the reprographics center, where we stored all of our drawing prints, had high overhead costs, reflecting on the bottom line."
Kollsman decided on SofTech's ProductCenter because of its "ability to manage the more complex Pro/E model hierarchy. Comprehensive out-of-the-box capabilities were important to us. Instead of initiating a long, costly consulting agreement, we were up and running with ProductCenter vaulting, revision/release control, and the ProductCenter Pro/Engineer Integrator in just three weeks."
Now, over 120 people throughout Kollsman have secure, instant access to data through ProductCenter. Next on the agenda for Kollsman is the integration of ProductCenter generated bills-of-material (BOM) to the company's Oracle Manufacturing ERP system. The goal: to use ProductCenter to automatically populate a BOM from Pro/Engineer and transfer BOM item master data directly to the ERP system. (For more, click here.)
So Much I/O, So Little Time
One of the leading manufacturers of artists' coated canvas needed to update the control equipment on its coating line and drying oven. The new drying oven was purchased with an Allen-Bradley SLC 5/04 controller, and the controls had to be integrated into the coating line.
At that point, an exact I/O count could not be determined and the precise location of sensor and operator stations was not known, and only a two-week downtime could be allotted for the retrofit.
"About that time, a unique, trapezoidal-shaped, yellow cable was shown to me by my local supplier. He claimed to be able to connect over 240 I/O on this two-conductor cable," observes the canvas maker's maintenance manager. This wiring system -- known as AS-Interface -- connects up to 31 nodes, each capable of four inputs and four outputs, for a total of 248 I/O per system.
Pepperl+Fuchs, as one of the 11 original members of the development consortium, has experience in all aspects of AS-Interface.
"Support from Pepperl+Fuchs was key to my decision to select AS-Interface for the new coating control system," added the maintenance manager. The system is completely deterministic with a cycle time of 5 ms for a fully loaded system. "A direct SLC 500 AS-Interface master was available for my PLC, and it did not require any additional software for configuration. I simply needed to address the modules and connect them to the cable. All functions and setup were accomplished using the SLC 500 ladder editor."
AS-Interface is extremely simple from the programming side, because the master is completely transparent. The I/O data is directly mapped into memory so it is identical to what the user would see using a conventionally wired system with standard I/O cards. When the manufacturer compared the material cost of AS-Interface to conventional wiring, AS-Interface was slightly more expensive. During installation, however, the labor costs were cut by almost 75%. An installation of this size would normally take two weeks of design time plus an additional two weeks pulling wire. The design and wire pulling times were cut down to about two days each. The installation was trouble-free and completed well within the two-week timeframe.
"Typical cost savings reported by our customers when considering all factors of material and labor cost averages about 40%," states Gary Frigyes, product manager at Pepperl+Fuchs, Inc. (For more, click here.)
Taking the Bother Out of BOMs
Armstrong Pumps Inc is a major supplier of high-quality HVAC and fluid flow equipment, and worldwide demand for fast-track cost-effective fluid flow equipment for commercial applications is rising dramatically. This changing of customer priorities has created significant growth potential. Armstrong has recognized the opportunity to respond more quickly to the customer segment, with more engineered-to-order, prefabricated systems.
"The challenge for us is to achieve growth with increasingly efficient production capabilities and engineering processes," says Peter Thomsen, marketing manager at Armstrong. "We want high velocity and flexibility, but not at the cost of engineering accuracy and/or quality."
Armstrong uses RuleStream's Rules-driven Production Management (RPM) solution to reduce the time needed to produce fully engineered quotes, complete BOMs, 3D drawings and manufacturing routings from days to hours, and in some cases from hours to minutes. Customer specifications and design parameters are entered into the RuleStream system, which applies Armstrong's design rules and works seamlessly with design software like SolidWorks to quickly produce accurate pricing and compelling, concise visualizations that increase sales win rate and customer confidence.
"In the past, each project configuration was calculated and had to be drawn by an engineer," according to Thomsen. "It was a slow, manually intensive process that would quickly become the bottleneck for growth. It was also 'out of touch' with the real world, where change-orders are commonplace. The traditional approach offers little flexibility and scant room for mid-stream design changes or adjustments." (For more, click here.)
Vectors as Simple as a Spreadsheet
ONERA reports to the French Ministry of Defense, and is an essential partner in the French and European aeronautics and space community. ONERA's Dept of Electromagnetism and Radar (DEMR) conducts testing and research to improve electromagnetic-based systems. It needed to build three automated test systems to measure reflection and transmission coefficients of planar materials as functions of frequency, incidence, and incident wave polarization in both co-polarization and cross polarization. The test program makes the measurements with a vector network analyzer, such as the Agilent 8720, which displays the results graphically and exports them automatically into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. The test system must control two antennas (one for emission and one for reception), positioners for the antennas, and translators for the material under test through the GPIB bus.
DEMR chose Agilent's VEE Pro for the application software for the automated characterization systems. The program automates the control of the positioners and translators. Then, it configures the vector network analyzer. Once the reflection and transmission measurements for the given antennas and sample positions are taken, VEE Pro modules calculate permittivity and permeability of the material under test. MatLab scripts, seamlessly integrated with VEE Pro, display complete, interactive graphs of the results. Finally, the program exports the results to an Excel spreadsheet to document the results. (For more, click here.)
