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News Release from: LK | Subject: CAMIO software
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial
Team on 14 July 2000
Mitutoyo CMM programming time halved by
software
At Luton-based Huntleigh Healthcare, the time taken to program a seven year old Mitutoyo co-ordinate measuring machine (CMM) has been halved using CAMIO software
At Luton-based Huntleigh Healthcare, the time taken to program a seven year old Mitutoyo co-ordinate measuring machine (CMM) has been halved following the installation last March (1999) of a suite of advanced software from another CMM company, the British manufacturer, LK Limited Included in the £34,000 package was LK's CAMIO software which enables inspection programs to be generated automatically from models created on Huntleigh's computer-aided design (CAD) system
This article was originally published on Engineeringtalk on 7 Sep 2000 at 8.00am (UK)
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Strong growth of 20 per cent year on year since 1985 has stretched the quality department and in 1998 it was put under the spotlight to see how its inspection activities could be streamlined.
In hindsight this was very timely, as today the inspection function supports five major new product development projects in addition to ongoing inspection of an increasing number of production parts.
Said product assurance manager, Simon Haywood, "Eighteen months ago the CMM was a bottleneck because we could not start programming until a first-off plastic moulding or alloy casting came in from the supplier.
Then a typical 20 to 30 minute inspection cycle took a day to program manually using the original DOS-driven software.
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Novem in Coventry has installed a co-ordinate measuring machine from LK which utilises component data from CAD files downloaded from Novem's German headquarters
"Now, the output file from our I-DEAS CAD system is pulled down to the CMM controller, translated through the IGES graphical exchange system and imported into LK's CAMIO which automatically generates the DMIS inspection program to run the measuring machine.
All this currently takes about four hours but will be quicker still when we have become more familiar with the technique." Responsible for programming the CMM is senior quality engineer, Carl Cooper, who commented, "The system is easy to use and very flexible.
I can even write drawing references in DMIS code manually into the program so that these appear in the hard copy which is printed out automatically at the end of the cycle using the CAMIO graphical reporting function." As programming is based on the source data from the solid model, the inspection routine is 95 per cent correct and requires only about half an hour's editing.
If Huntleigh had tried to prepare a CMM program from engineering drawings, the result would have been nearer 60 per cent correct, according to Mr Haywood.
This would have been unacceptably slow to get right, hence the need previously to wait for the first-off component so that teach-in programming techniques could be employed.
Now, by being able to work on the CMM program in advance using the computer-generated model, an initial sample inspection report is ready within a couple of hours of the component arriving whereas the report took several days to produce with the old programming methodology.
The latter was regarded by Huntleigh staff as so tortuous that there was a tendency to produce first-off reports based on conventional metrology methods using verniers, height gauges and the like.
CMM utilisation was consequently low and this was the spur for retrofitting the most user-friendly software available to simplify not only programming but also operation of the machine, enabling inexperienced staff to use it.
Inspex 98 at the NEC in Birmingham was instrumental in allowing Mr Haywood to determine that the most advanced CAD to CMM software on the market was LK's CAMIO.
Being compatible with Windows 98 and supporting the industry standard DMIS protocol, it was considered to be a year ahead of other solutions and was seen to work in practice.
Subsequent demonstrations at LK's Donington factory confirmed this and training was provided both there and in Luton before and after the retrofit.
Sensible use of the CMM allows Huntleigh to complete its inspection routines in a single day shift, leaving plenty of spare capacity should the workload increase further.
Carl Cooper restricts inspection routines to critical features and only the more complex components are put onto the machine in the first place.
CMM utilisation will be maximised by empowering a wide range of staff to operate it, including personnel involved in the complaints and systems review departments, project engineers and of course the dedicated quality staff.
Helping to deskill CMM operation is another LK software product, the Launchpad operator interface.
It allows photographic images of components to be inserted for easy identification and presents a graphical menu structure detailing how to position the component and instigate the program.
LK Visual CMES was also supplied during the retrofit, this being an icon-based programming system offering 'teach and learn' programming facilities.
Following initial inspection, ISO sampling of production components at Huntleigh is based on a nominal AQL of 6.5%, which means that 32 in a batch of 200 is randomly inspected, or 80 in 1,000.
This is found to be adequate because, as Mr Haywood points out, when one moulded ABS or nylon 66 part is found to be correct they should all be right.
Benefits of working from the electronic design data extend to dealings with other parties.
Internally, feedback from quality control to R and D is faster leading to a shortening of the development time for a new product.
Externally, Mr Haywood and his team can quickly advise the moulding and casting suppliers, which also work more and more from the CAD model, of any inaccuracies at the prototype stage so that the tooling may be modified accordingly.
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