July 2008 Edition
CUTTING TOOLS
It’s the Thought that Counts
The job shop is becoming the thinking-man’s game
A customer’s engineer specified machined brackets, but a shop owner, thinking outside of the norm, proposed a fabricated bracket that not only met the specs, but saved time and money
Bob Olree, Publisher
It’s almost counterintuitive that something as abstract as
thought can impact something as concrete as profits, but it can. Entrenched ways
of thinking limit innovation. Approaching problems with a different viewpoint
can streamline processes and boost profits.
A seminar, "Sheet Metal Design," presented by Annette Doyle,
training manager, Trumpf USA, Farmington, CT, not only described the company’s
advancements in lasers and bending technology, but provided insights into
changing standard ways of fabrication thinking.
While shop owners recognize that outdated
equipment limits the ability to excel, few examine their own
thought processes to avoid outdated approaches.
For example, one of the first things a shop does when it
receives a request for a quotation is to determine the best way to produce the
part: Which machines are best suited for manufacture? Which tools will be most
efficient? What processes are best for fabrication? These, and other factors,
are what owners use to determine the edge over their competitors.
An owner examines a proposed part until everything about it
is known. But, the owner may ignore one of the most important factors: examining
the design. Rather than accept the same-old-same-old process, the seminar showed
how to take a step back to look at the part to retain the requested
functionality, but save time, material, weight, processes, and, most
importantly, money.
Stuck in a Rut
Too often, we all have the "that’s how we’ve always done it"
mentality. Almost every shop has encountered files from a customer for a part
that would be impossible to make as designed. Most shops work to resolve the
problem with work-arounds, doing what the customer’s engineer wants. There are
alternatives: changes in thinking that Doyle described.
Doyle provided an example in the seminar that showed
attendees a heavy structural steel bearing support bracket. Its primary purpose
was to mount a bearing that supported a through-shaft, but it also served as a
mounting point for a light sheet metal tray to catch paper clipping waste from
the host machine.
If the shop owner quoted the job as presented, the bid might
have been successful, but an opportunity to become the engineer’s hero by
simplifying construction and cutting costs would have been missed.
Access the Inner Two-year-old
In her example, Doyle showed the audience how advanced
approaches to thinking produced a savings of 58 percent in the manufacturing of
a part, compared to the processes specified by the customer’s engineer. Besides
that example, there were others, such as a machined aluminum bracket to hold
small, interior wire bundles.
As designed, the part would require a lot of material
removal, drilling of two mounting holes, as well as other small holes for the
wire ties. The part didn’t require precision machining, but that produced a
handsome piece.
In this case, the shop owner asked "Why?" questions, then
redesigned the part for use with standard sheet metal fabricating processes. The
money-savings was significant.
Trumpf runs its three-day Sheet Metal Design workshops in Connecticut, or can
present the workshops onsite. Shop veterans will find how to take best advantage
of the capabilities of new equipment to stay ahead of the competition by
offering added value to customer requests. Trumph
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What do you think?
Will the information in this article increase efficiency or save time, money, or effort? Let us know by e-mail from our website at
www.ModernApplicationsNews.com or e-mail the editor at
pnofel@nelsonpub.com.