Product category:
CAM, CNC and production management software
News Release from: Pathtrace Engineering Systems | Subject: EdgeCAM
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial
Team on 07 August 2003
Software brings design and production
together
At IKV Tools, Pathtrace's EdgeCAM offline programming software's Strategy Manager has been used to break down any internal barriers between design and production.
At IKV Tools, Pathtrace's EdgeCAM offline programming software's Strategy Manager has been used to break down any internal barriers between design and production As a result, even at the early stages of tool design, the production oriented programming software forewarns the design team if, for instance, they have selected features such as hole dimensions for which tooling is not currently available and ensures design for manufacture is strictly adhered to
As a result, says Managing Director and joint owner of the Swedish toolmaker Ingvar Johansson: "Already Strategy Manager has enabled us to save around 30 working days a year by reducing our programming times from around four hours to 30 minutes".
Each designer at IKV has reference to the procedures and knows as he designs the cutting and bending tools he is able to work around current and therefore proven methods.
When a value is changed during design it then automatically permeates through all stages of design and into production due to EdgeCAM's high levels of associativity.
When working on a SolidWorks model in EdgeCAM, if the design is altered on a networked computer, the EdgeCAM programmer is automatically warned that the part has changed.
And, due to EdgeCAM having a fully supported launcher inside SolidWorks this negates the need for any third party software and because it uses the same Parasolid kernel, means that no data can be lost or needs to be redrawn for clarification.
IKV is one of Sweden's leading toolmakers.
Based in Forsheda, its customers range across automotive, telecomms, leisure and white goods for which it develops and manufactures highly customised cutting and bending tools.
IKV has been a SolidWorks user for many years and adopted EdgeCAM's Strategy Manager in order to capture the company's expertise and best working practices, so as to build them into the business' working strategy.
Strategy Manager, which was introduced in Version 7.0 of EdgeCAM, enables production engineers to define machining strategies on a flow chart style tool layout working from first principles, which effectively drives the CAM process.
This enables machining methods to be kept consistent, best practices maximised within the organisation and once set up, as IKV has found, programming time reduced to a matter of minutes or seconds.
IKV Tools has taken the concept further by feeding the data back to its designers, not as a deskilling operation but to close the loop to enable higher productivity, improved consistency of working methods and quality levels to be achieved.
In addition, this concept of working in CAM has eliminated designer "specials" and therefore process variables, optimised the use of tooling available and minimised much of the mundane work that would otherwise face the CNC programmers.
"EdgeCAM has enabled us to work together more effectively", says joint owner Clas Magnusson, who describes how Strategy Manager avoids complex macros and there is no need for a database of processes.
It is simply written in the user's own words to a Microsoft Windows interface and can be applied through a right click of the mouse.
"On the shop floor, machine tools do not have to be completely reset as the program always takes into consideration what tools are available and, by simplifying what we do, more of our people can handle jobs which previously demanded specialist knowledge.
It took just three days training to achieve this level of competence and now even if the supervisor is away, there is always another person able to keep production running".
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