PEPS helps Bond keep his cool

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Nov 25, 2002

Talbot Designs recently updated its PEPS milling module to the latest version, which played a leading role in the creation of set pieces for the latest James Bond movie, Die another Day.

Since 1947 Talbot Designs of Finchley, London has manufactured products for a broad spectrum of clients - from the yellow beacons on pelican crossings to set designs for films such as Star Wars and Harry Potter.

A PEPS Mill user since 1995, the company recently updated its milling module to the latest version, which played a leading role in the creation of set pieces for the latest James Bond movie, Die another Day.

Said Richard Woolff, Sales Director: "I'd been looking at CADCAM in the early nineties and had spoken to Camtek back them.

Several years later I was in the market for a system and Camtek was one of the companies I contacted - I even spoke to the same salesman.

With a product such as CADCAM the stability of the company was important to me.

We purchased their entry-level PEPS system as it more than met our needs at the time and was the easiest to use.

Our business grew, as did the complexity of the products we were asked to design.

After re-assessing the market I decided to upgrade PEPS as the new features would broaden the work we could handle.

Also, our programmers were already familiar with the interface and would require minimal training on newer functions such as solid simulations, prove-out and tooling libraries".

Once the PEPS update was installed the most noticeable benefit was that of speed - on average jobs were taking 25% less time to program.

This was attributed to many of the now-automated features and predefined parameters.

Shopfloor flexibility was also improved, as PEPS takes full advantage of each machine's features and allows jobs to be moved easily between them.

Commented Woolff, "Moving a job from one machine to another is as easy as printing a document on a different printer on our network".

Talbot's business is such that many of their jobs are small runs or even one-off jobs.

For the Bond movie Die another Day it was asked to produce a number of items for a scene set in the Ice Palace in Iceland.

Scale models were submitted by the Eon Production Art Department, and technical drawings were quickly generated for the prototypes.

"At this point, we were able to quickly change small details within PEPS to enable continuing development and tweaking of the internal supports of the chairs.

Due to tolerances in the manufacturing processes, some dimensions required individual adjustment and the ease of use of PEPS allowed us to fine tune the measurements".

Many customers supply their required parts in electronic format, which often prove to be poorly drawn.

PEPS includes an auto-repair function, repairing several thousand errors per minute.

Woolff added, "Getting information into PEPS is a much quicker, cleaner process.

PEPS also checks for errors and allows us to simulate cutting on-screen so we no longer need to prove a part - it generates 100% accurate, machine-ready code every time".

In a market where delivery times and margins are crucial, Woolff's decision to invest in new software rather than new machines has been a good one.

"In addition to the initial improvements and automation since the PEPS update, we've noticed a subtle, constant improvement in our design and manufacturing processes.

By putting a bit more in at the CAM end we are able to get much more out of our existing machines".

But Talbot also has plans for hardware expansion in the future: "We always look at modernising machinery, and now anticipate buying new equipment in the future to cope with the extra capacity and flexibility that PEPS has delivered".