FOCUS ON BENDING
Bending operations at GLA-WEL . Simon Welkener , Marcel Kemner and Stephan Glahs of GLA-WEL .
Significant time savings
Stephan Glahs added that , in terms of digitalisation and integration with ERP , in the past , the focus was always just on the lasercutting machines . Bending was an external process that relied on shop floor data input by the operator to link it back into the ERP system . This meant that costs , times etc . had to be estimated at the planning stage , rather than based on hard data . This reliance on a manual skilled process was a major challenge for GLA-WEL .
“ Now , with CADMAN-SDI , when you put a job into the ERP system , the files are automatically transferred to SDI in the background and you immediately get back the production time and the development for the laser-cut blank . So , two steps that would previously have been done more or less manually are now carried out completely automatically ,” explained Simon Welkener .
“ You can ’ t simply measure the throughput time based on how long the part spends in the bending department . It starts when the customer places the order and ends when you deliver it . The bending itself is only a very small part of that . The cost comes as much from the preparation time as from the bending itself . Before we had the LVD pressbrakes , the customer placed an order , the sales administrator created an order in the system , then production planning set out the production stages . Next , the order went into design engineering where they calculated the laser blank geometry . Then , it went back to Production Planning to release it to the shop floor ,” he added .
That system has now changed with its new LVD purchases .
GLA-WEL confirmed that , on the first of the LVD press brakes to be installed , it has seen an 18.52 % increase in productivity
“ Now , when we get an order from a customer , if they can supply STEP files we can go straight into production . In the past , we needed two days just for administration before we could start making an item . We can now eliminate these two days . We only need to put the order in the system , check that the drawings are OK and we can then send it straight into manufacturing . We have saved 50 % of our administration time ,” clarified Welkener .
The next significant set of time savings come from automated offline programming in CADMAN-B .
“ We used to program at the machine , so you can image how that has improved our production times and capacity ,” said Stephan Glahs . “ Now , we simply import the STEP file and it is done . The amount of time saved across all these areas is enormous .”
CADMAN-JOB comes into play when the order goes into production .
“ Because you define the flow of jobs that have to be completed on a machine in CADMAN-JOB , you can re-arrange them to suit current requirements and machine availability and minimise non-productive time ,” explained Stephan Glahs .
The original intention had just been to buy the ToolCell press brake , which was suitable for automating fast turnaround and small batch work , but , according to Marcel Kemner , the company bought three machines because of the Easy-Form ® Laser angle measurement
GLA-WEL GmbH is based in Melle , Lower Saxony .
system for accuracy and further time savings .
“ In the past , we would bend the part , take it out , measure it and bend it again ( sometimes three or four times ). With the Easy-Form you bend it , take it out and it is finished ,” added Kemner .
Overall , GLA-WEL confirmed that , on the first of the LVD press brakes to be installed , it has seen an 18.52 % increase in productivity , compared to a competitor ’ s two-year-old machine .
The LakeLab project , supplied by GLA-WEL , at Lake Stechlin at Brandenburg , Germany .
Octoflex customer portal
The next step is to take digitalisation even further , said Stephan Glahs .
“ We have a customer portal where the customer can upload his drawings , get a quote and order complete laser-cut and formed parts . These come through automatically into our production . Now , we have also started to offer the Octoflex package to other sheet metalworking companies so that they can use the ERP system and portal for their customers ,” offered Glahs .
“ When you combine an ERP system that specialises in sheet metal with the LVD software suite , then you have something that is quite special ,” he concluded .
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