Ohio Shop Installs Cobots and "Exceeds Expectations Tenfold"
Cincinnati's Vi-Cas Manufacturing produces vacuum cups for all industries, including aerospace and automotive. Recently, the company turned to ProCobots to automate the process of loading and unloading its Hurco machines. As Hurco's Joe Hopkins explains, the results can be summed up in three words: faster and better.
Tucked away on the east side of Cincinnati, Ohio, Vi-Cas Manufacturing has been making vacuum cups for over 50 years. While they may fly under the radar to some, vacuum cups are used in nearly every industry. Vi-Cas Mfg. is the number one seller of vacuum cups, with customers all over the world.
Vi-Cas machinists Derrick Cooke [left] and Tyson John [right] hold parts in front of the Hurco VM10i machining center and ProCobots system that produced them.
"Vacuum cups, as small and innocuous as they may seem, they're used in everything from contact lenses to airplane wings," said Johnny Cole, Plant Manager.
Vi-Cas handles the entire manufacturing process, from raw materials to the finished product. That process begins in their machine shop, where four Hurco VM10(i)s cut parts.
"We onsite machine all of our fittings that go in all of our cups," explained Cole. "After the machining is made, our parts go into production."
With so many companies in need of vacuum cups, Vi-Cas is always exploring ways to shorten lead times and serve more customers. Automation stood out as an intriguing option, but it needed to be easy to implement, simple to operate, and reliable. ProCobots -- Hurco’s automation solution -- checks all those boxes.
VIDEO: ProCobots Customer Testimonial: Vi-Cas Manufacturing
ProCobots automation is completely integrated with the Hurco control through Hurco's Automation Job Manager software. This allows the user to manage the collaborative robot conversationally on the Hurco control, rather than having to learn robot programming. Simply put, if you can use a Hurco, you can use ProCobots automation.
This key advantage gave Vi-Cas confidence they could quickly incorporate automation into their process and was a major factor in their decision to purchase the ProCobots ProFeeder system. The technology did not disappoint.
"When the ProCobots first showed up on site, it was a Thursday if I'm not mistaken. By Friday they were able to have the machine running, and the following week my employees were already programming and learning the machine," recalled Cole.
Vi-Cas' ProCobots ProFeeder system retrieves a finished part from the Hurco machining center.
ProCobots' integrated control system squashed the learning curve for Vi-Cas' machinists and enabled them to automate jobs effectively within days of the robot's arrival.
"Pretty easy once you got your dimensions and what your loads are and your grid," explained machinist Derrick Cooke. "And we go ahead and save that job setup, and it's also got the location of the vice, retrieves it from the vice. Doing the two-op(eration) with the flipper. This part here is the same part (with a) different hole mounting. All we got to do is change the programs that's running."
The part flipper is an optional accessory that allows for multiple-operation machining without machinist intervention. When it's time for the next operation, the ProCobots' automatic doors open, the robot picks up the part from the vice and places it in the flipper. The flipper then turns the part over, and the robot puts it back in the vice so the Hurco can cut the other side.
The ProCobots system was strongly embraced by the Vi-Cas team, which was excited to hand off the mundane task of loading and unloading parts.
"It really just saves time from a person having to stand there and load and unload the machine all day long," said machinist Jeremy Bertsch. "It allows the person to go do something else."
The ProCobots part flipper turns over a part so that its other side can be machined.
Cole elaborated, "In machining, I think the thought processes are only a person can do X or Y or Z. What they came to find out was the machine wasn't here to replace them, the machine was here to complement their abilities. Now they can set up a machine to run a thousand parts that they would spend three or four days standing in front of a machine working. They can set it up to go, it'll run, and inside of two days, I'll have a thousand parts while that employee was able to accomplish whatever goals he needed."
Additionally, by automating their jobs, Vi-Cas was able to further increase their productivity through lights-out machining. After employees clock out, jobs run overnight, and the team shows up the next morning to a batch of finished parts.
"It's a non-stop process," noted Bertsch.
Vi-Cas is pleased with their decision to take the leap toward automation. Incorporating it into their workflow was simple, and the team raves about how ProCobots has increased their efficiency and productivity.
"It's exceeded all my expectations tenfold," explained Cole. "The gaining that I get in time and material is twice what the cost of the machine was. Efficiency is the key to production. It has just astoundingly made the processes more efficient. I can't say enough about that, how well it has behaved and how much time it has saved me just in production and man hours of doing something. It's amazing to me how simple it was and how productive it actually is for the coming generations."
A batch of parts sit in a container following an automated job at Vi-Cas Mfg.
ProCobots has been so helpful that Vi-Cas management intends to purchase more robots to pair with their other Hurco machines.
"It's been such a success. I do plan on adding more later because it gives my employees so much time to do the other requirements that can't be done by a robot. It just does its job, and it does its job very well."
Bertsch concluded, "Any company needs to look for ways to improve -- faster, better, more efficient ways to do things -- and I think that's what we found here with this thing. It just saves time. You can't measure it to be honest. This is a lot faster and better."
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