Punch aids growth for West Midlands fabricator

Licom's Advanced Punch aids growth for West Midlands fabricator Tanmill Fabrications.

For any original equipment manufacturer, regardless of size, geographic location, or the industrial sector being supplied, satisfaction and knowledge that the end product will be produced within tolerance and on time is, to the majority of companies worldwide, probably the prime consideration.

That was certainly the case when West Midlands-based Tanmill Fabrications, having purchased a new CNC turret punch and press brake to satisfy an increase in business, looked to source a CAD/CAM package to effect right first time production.

The Tanmill organisation is made up of two distinct companies, Tanmill Limited and Tanmill Fabrications.

In the former, plastic cabs and vandal guards for construction vehicles and fork lift trucks have been produced from flat sheets on a Wadkin CNC Router using Licom's Advanced Mill since 1994.

Although Tanmill Ltd can produce three types of cab, including an all-plastic version, in the fabrication arm of the business the main operation until the middle of 1999 was the manufacture of bespoke steel cab's for fork lift trucks - dealing with the dealerships of Caterpillar, Daewoo and others.

However, the company has found an unlikely source of new business, resulting in the purchase of a Haco Omatic 130R CNC turret punch, Haco press brake, and Licom's Advanced Punch, as Director, Kevin Brewer explained.

'We receive World War 2, D-Day amphibious vehicles, procured by The London Frog Company from all over the world, in whatever state they are found in.

A typical example is one that had been standing in a field for thirty years.

In that instance we stripped it completely to the chassis, rebuilding the hull, but with the last four we have undertaken, all we have received is the hull, which has required very little work, and the running gear.

We have produced the cabin - steel floor, seating, and canopy - fitted Perkin diesel engines, and the transmission, restoring the vehicle to sea worthiness, and transforming them into modern day 'Riverboats', capable of carrying 30 passengers on sightseeing tours on the River Thames.' For example, in producing both steel panels of varying sizes to repair the hull and steel floor in the cab, measurements are taken and accurate 2D drawings are produced using AutoCAD and Mechanical Desktop.

Working in conjunction with Licom's AlphaCAM, which includes all normal CAD geometry creation, it allows us to draw in 3D, pull bits apart, unfold etc down on the shop floor.

Transferred to the design office - which see three seats running AutoCAD 2000, and Licom's Advanced Mill and Advanced Punch - tool paths are then quickly produced using Advanced Punch and loaded on to a disk, which in turn is transferred to a shop floor PC situated by the Haco turret punch - DNC linking is planned.

'The Haco turret punch from Kingsland Engineering, has working X, Y, parameters of 1500 x 1500mm - although the largest sheet currently machined is 3m x 1.5m, which requires a sheet being repositioned - it allows us to produce doors, roof, front and rear screens and all other structural facets in mild steel.

Machined sheet is welded to the hull where required.

The Alpha Punch is a really easy functional software programme that allows us to punch, nibble and clear area operations with user-defined tools and turrets.

Complete or part profiles can be punched, plus single hits with tools are automatically selected and auto-indexed to match part geometries.' 'The punch press manufacturer was intent on recommending a particular software package,' continued Brewer, 'but we did not want to see operators train with new software and from our experience of the reliability of Licom's Advanced Mill software on the Wadkin Router in our plastics division, the decision to approach Licom to ascertain the availability of a suitable CAD/CAM solution, was a logical one.

On finding that Licom specialised in a variety of production engineering CAM solutions we opted for Advanced Punch, which we have found very similar to Advanced Mill in tooling up.' 'In fact,' added Brewer, 'the initial training, and experience of Advanced Mill on the router over the last six years, plus the commonality and simplicity of the Licom programmes meant we did not need any training when we purchased Alpha Punch.

The Help Line operated by Licom is all we have had to occasionally rely on.' All hulls are inspected by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and then water tested before the cabs and passenger aspects are built-on.

Final approval by the Vehicle Inspectorate sees a finished vehicle transported down to the Thames.

'The Haco-Licom CAM combination now allows us to produce ten sets of cab in a day, where previously using plasma cutters and manual techniques, it took us a week to do just one cab.' concluded, Kevin Brewer.

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