PRODUCTS & EQUIPMENT
Adige LT5 Fiber Tube Laser drives process improvement along the line
The new Adige LT5 Tube Laser machine installed at Olicana Products, a specialist provider of tubular metal the productivity of the business and overall product quality. At the same time these improvements are opening up new potential sales opportunities for the Ilkley, West Yorkshire-based business.
W
ith 90 per cent of its turnover coming from a select group of
10 customers Olicana has to be focussed on maintaining close and positive relationships with its customers. It achieves this by providing solutions in the form of designing for manufacture, and the ability to meet the challenges put to it by those customers. “We are competing against some of the best suppliers of tube product from around the world, that are forward thinking and that we want to work with. We provide them with our expertise products, in return they continue to challenge that expertise,” says Rupert Pearson, Managing Director, Olicana Products. With the furniture and automotive sectors generating Olicana has embarked on a project to enhance its manufacturing capability. The investment in an Adige LT5 Tube Laser is a major part of that project, with the decision to purchase the Adige LT5 Fiber Laser system being taken to allow Olicana to take better control of existing processes; bring more work in-house and; to develop new manufacturing strategies that will give Olicana a distinct advantage over its competitors.
Most of the work undertaken by Olicana is thin-walled tube for which the Adige LT5 is ideally suited to cutting. Making use of Nitrogen as the assist gas for the Fiber Laser, Olicana is creating components with very clean cut edges with the
8 IMT December 2015/January 2016
The accuracy and cleanliness of the cut produced by the Adige LT5 is allowing Olicana Products to develop new welding techniques that
accuracy of those cuts leading to overall improvements in product quality. Furthermore, that accuracy the welding processes further along the manufacturing chain. This welding can now be automated due to the consistent quality and accuracy produced on the LT5. “The purchase of the Adige
LT5 Tube Laser wasn’t just about manufacturing, it was part of an ongoing strategy that will deliver improvements throughout the manufacturing process. Bringing in technology of this kind forces you to revise your thinking in order to
are now witnessing productivity improvements, not only in the cutting of tube, but also in every process after the tube has been cut, thanks to the improved quality and accuracy of that cut tube. With our business model we are constantly looking for solutions to problems that our customers doesn’t always know they have, with the addition of the LT5 and the subsequent investments we are making to bring the rest of our facility up to the same standard, we are better placed to achieve this,” says Rupert Pearson The Adige LT5 is the most compact machine in the Tube Laser family and has been developed with
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the processing of tubes with thin and medium wall thickness in mind. running costs are low and up time allows a wide variety of materials to be cut. The LT5’s six axes are digitally controlled via the Siemens 840D control, which added to the maximum raw tube capacity of mm make it extremely versatile. Key to its development was the ability to synchronise all of the machine’s sub-systems, such as tube handling and measuring without any time loss. Furthermore, the LT5 only requires relatively simple adjustments to change from one job to the next, making changeover extremely quick. All important functions are located close to the operator station. The LT5 also comes with the advantage of Artube BLM’s dedicated CAD CAM software that assists with design, programming and process/production management. Artube features many user friendly menus that will allow the user to move from of minutes. During the component design phase the software also allows the designer to exploit all of the machine’s functions to ensure correct design for manufacture is undertaken. Full 3D simulation then including providing cycle time and cost-per-part estimates before the At that stage a second piece of software, Protube, is available to optimise production.
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