Shop Solutions Continued from page 50
Its most recent automation addition from Fastems LLC (West Chester, OH) involved retrofitting a FPC-750 container system to its Doosan 4000 horizontal machining center with 279-tool ATC. Retrofitting automation of this type is a story in itself, but first let’s go back to the beginning of this fourth-generation family-owned company’s commitment to automation.
Third and fourth generations of family leadership at Triad Tool (from left to right): Gordon Hurley, Eric Wichelhaus, Jesse Wichelhaus, Jim Wichelhaus, and Margaret Hurley.
“Twenty-five years ago we made a conscious decision to grow the business through advanced technology to capture valuable legacy machining information and transition from vertical machining to horizontal machining centers,” said Eric Wichelhaus, the third-generation president of the company. “A significant portion of this process grew out of the principles of progressive dies that my grandfather designed and built, which emphasizes single-piece workflow rather than batch processing,” said Wichelhaus. Triad Tool’s core competency is primarily in aircraft compo- nents for commercial and military aviation. “Typical parts are complex and prismatically shaped parts which require machin- ing of multiple surfaces. They are demanding to machine and require advanced fixturing, allowing access to the workpiece from various positions and angles, with the intent of minimizing the number of workholding fixtures,” said Wichelhaus. “Very talented dedicated people at various levels in our shop have allowed Triad to implement continuous advanced technology over the last 30 years. It became clear to me that as productive as the horizontal machines were, we had to develop untended capability/capacity, which would increase the daily/weekly throughput,” said Wichelhaus. Triad Tool’s first acquisition was a KIWA 400-mm pallet pool machine. “We bought our first multipallet machine 10 years ago or so, with the intention of using it not for production, but rather to run multiple jobs simultaneously,” said Wichelhaus.
“We found immediate success in that first machine, so within less than a year we ordered a twin to it. From there we went larger in size and bought a four-axis Okuma 630-mm horizontal machining center with a 210-tool magazine CAT-50 taper. That gave us the ability to run larger parts and/or a higher density package of mixed jobs running simultaneously. The increased work envelope and large tombstones worked out well in expanding our capabilities, as well as exposure to larger hog-outs and castings,” said Wichelhaus. Shortly thereafter, Triad acquired the assets from a company that was going out of business, one of which was a Mitsui Seiki HU 80, an 800-mm six-pallet pool machine with a 250-tool mag- azine. “The machine was like new with many advanced options, but had no broken tool detection. The machine was certainly configured to run untended, but without broken tool detection, we would not even consider the thought,” said Wichelhaus. “If the wrong tool fails, we could be looking at a train wreck in the morning.” Triad upgraded the HU80 with a Renishaw laser bro- ken tool detection immediately, just as it had done in configuring all the other stand-alone horizontals with broken tool detection.”
FPC-750 container system with 12 pallets from Fastems LLC (West Chester, OH) was retrofitted to a Doosan 4000 HMC with a 279-tool ATC at Triad Tool.
Most of Triad’s jobs have relatively long cycle times. Triad is basically a one-shift operation, running from 6 am to 4:30 pm. A skeleton crew of three machinists who come in at 3 pm, work until 2 in the morning. “The second shift will run the stand- alone machines supporting hot jobs and don’t have anything to do with the FMCs,” said Wichelhaus. “We typically achieve 60–100 hours of untended produc- tion every night from our six cells, as well as the stand-alone two pallet HMCs, which have the capability to run lights-out,” said Wichelhaus.
January 2014 |
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