Makino’s Application Engineering Team Leader discusses workholding in high-production or automated applications.
Manufacturing engineers understand that following the 3-2-1 method for locating a part establishes three mutually perpendicular datum planes. Three points are needed to establish the primary plane, two points for the secondary plane, and one point for the tertiary plane. But when it comes to designing a robust process in a high-volume or automated production environment, there are some key points that’ll make your operation trouble free with greater reliability.
In high-volume production, chips can pile up. This is why it’s important to design proper chip shedding on fixtures by eliminating flat shelves and creating sloped surfaces to provide a path for chips to flow inside the work zone. External hydraulic tubing on the fixture can also cause chips to get hung up. To prevent this, gun drill the fixtures and use a manifold to internally plumb the hydraulic lines needed for the fixture actuation.
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Its modular box concept, independent lines, and the combination of interior and exterior painting in a single box provide a degree of scalability and flexibility previously only for small-scale series.
The EcoProBooth opens new perspectives in spray booth technology for car manufacturers. Its modular box concept, independent lines, and the combination of interior and exterior painting in a single box provide a degree of scalability and flexibility previously only for small-scale series. With its new booth concept, Dürr addresses the critical topic of energy efficiency. EcoProBooth reduces energy consumption by around 40% and carbon emissions. The existing systems that continue to operate with wet scrubbing will save 75%.
EcoProBooth boxes can transform individual painting lines into an efficient and flexible painting environment. An integrated paint process (IPP) for 60 jobs per hour with eight zones for base coat and six zones for clear coat, split between two rigid lines with 30 jobs per hour, becomes five parallel EcoProBooth lines. Each feature one position for all base coat applications and one for all clear coat applications. Fourteen zones become ten boxes. Each line can be individually controlled and brought online or offline as needed.
Greater efficiency ensures optimal distribution of the bodies to the EcoProBooth boxes. The painting scope doesn’t determine the cycle, since the booth size paints all standard passenger car types, from compact cars to SUVs. The size and design of the box are standard, straightforward conversions, and extensions are possible without a knock-on effect on production in other box segments.
Dürr Open House 2021 – Product Manager Daniel Ackermann in the test setup for the EcoProBooth in the technical center in Bietigheim-Bissingen
The painting robots look after the interior and exterior painting in one box using the application technology optimally coordinated to the body in question. The new EcoBell4 Pro Ux universal atomizer meets the highest standards for painting quality and ensures only four painting robots are needed per box. Integrating all painting tasks into one box eliminates the time required to convey bodies, when the robots are inactive, between the process steps for interior and exterior painting.
The service cubicles located in the corners of the booth have a continuous flow of fresh air through them. Employees can safely access them without breathing apparatus to clean or do minor servicing tasks on atomizers and tools while painting continues. At the same time, the amount of cleaning required can be adapted to the degree of contamination of the respective component using the DXQ software from Dürr.
Low energy consumption thanks to maximum air recirculation percentage
The highly efficient modular concept has enabled Dürr to reduce the booth area. In the example mentioned, the volumetric flow rate of the process air is around 20% lower. The modular concept minimizes energy consumption and reduces carbon emissions and operating costs.
The EcoProBooth has a highly recirculated air rate from its low energy needs with a ratio of recirculated air to fresh air of 95:5, the process air is supplemented with 5% fresh air, taken directly from the clean room without any further air supply system. The box features overspray separation with the latest generation of the EcoDryScrubber. Once the paint particles are removed from the air, they are reconditioned in a recirculating air unit assigned directly to the painting booth, reducing energy consumption and costs. The new EcoDryScrubber can purify almost twice as much air as the predecessor models with just one filter stage per module. The highly compact design of the filter stage integrates perfectly into the box concept. Compared to a traditional wet separation system, Dürr reduces the energy needed by 40%. For a painting line with wet scrubbing, this increases to 75%.
Sustainable investment for all eventualities
In addition to efficiency and flexibility, sustainability is an increasingly important competitive factor for the manufacturing sector. With its new system layout, Dürr has created conditions for needs-based manufacturing and efficient use of resources. Significant reductions in the volumetric flow rate of the process air and the high recirculation rate keep energy consumption and carbon emissions low. The intelligent box layout reduces material consumption by cutting losses when changing color. Subdividing the line into shorter segments additionally allows for the intelligent distribution of painting orders to minimize color changes, saving paint and flushing agent consumption and reducing costs and VOC emissions.
Sandvik Coromant’s automotive applications specialist discusses how applying rotary broaching principles has created burr-free milling cutters.
Aluminum is easy to machine but can leave burrs and sharp edges. Manufacturers were using milling cutters with lots of teeth, so tool setup was taking half an hour. Then, cutting in the same area for a length of time causes a burr to form pretty quickly.
We adapted technology from rotary broaching, which is typically used for finishing. We eliminated most of that setup time by using fixed-pocket inserts, so you don’t need to be in the tool room for long.
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Desktop Metal received a $7.9 million order for the mass production of metal automotive powertrain components at scale.
Desktop Metal, mass production additive manufacturing (AM) solutions provider, received a $7.9 million order for binder jet AM systems from a major German car maker for the mass production of metal automotive powertrain components at scale.
"We are proud to be working with a number of major, global automotive OEMs to expand their adoption of additive manufacturing for the series production of end-use car components," says Ric Fulop, Founder and CEO of Desktop Metal. "This milestone order is evidence of the performance and economics that make our binder jetting solutions the most advanced in the world and a testament to our teams who have been working tirelessly to help make the vision of mass production via additive manufacturing a reality."
Desktop Metal offers the industry's broadest portfolio of high-throughput additive manufacturing solutions for the mass production of end-use parts, with support for a comprehensive and diverse materials library with more than 250 materials across metals, composites, polymers, ceramics, biocompatible materials, sand, wood, and elastomers. The company has a rapidly growing customer base across industries such as automotive, healthcare, and dental, consumer products, aerospace, and more, supported by a team of over 1,350 dedicated employees across the globe.
DEES Hydraulic Industrial Co. Ltd. discusses hot-forming, Industry 4.0, improved stamping accuracy, and how it serves the metalforming market.
Hot forming steel and alloys supports lightweight, high-strength car bodies and frames, components revolutionizing automotive manufacturing. DEES integrates Industry 4.0 technologies into hot forming, automating, and collecting data with the transfer system.
DEES has successfully established hot-forming lines for certain high-strength steels, the most difficult materials to form, so lower temperature aluminum and other alloys will be less challenging. The technology has become increasingly common throughout Europe.
We expect the technology to become more common as DEES and other providers show how heat can shape high-strength materials, overcome post-forming bounceback issues, and provide accuracy for finished parts.
Carbon-fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) composite materials are also popular for European manufacturers, and DEES has produced several composite hot-forming systems as well.
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