AUTOMATION & INDUSTRY 4.0 AUTOMATING FOR PRODUCTIVITY
DMC-APC to manufacturers are up to a 75%
machine tool drop open time, savings in
operational oor space and savings in
machine tool investment.”
For instance, if the machining cycles are
short, the necessity to make several pallet
changes within one hour decreases machine
tool utilisation signi cantly. Secondly, with
the DMC-APC’s double pallet capability, the
pallet change time is about half a minute
compared to two minutes with a single pallet
changer.
Thirdly, the DMC-APC saves oor space
because machines without APCs have a
smaller footprint generally. Fourthly,
customers do not have to invest in machine
tool APCs, which can cost up to $100,000
each. Lastly, the new generation DMC-APC
can accommodate higher weights up to
1,000kg.
Saarimaa says the DMC-APC is a “new
way to integrate machine tools with Fastems’
pallet automation, and operators can load
directly to the MC table and it can act as
an automatic pallet changer”. The
technology he adds, can serve
operators quicker and also
service bottle neck appliances,
like wash machines quicker and
more ef ciently.
SOFTWARE UPDATES
During the webinar, Fastems also
launched a new version of its
manufacturing management software
(MMS) v7.5 that comes with extended
capabilities and were released last month.
The software is used by manufacturers to
plan, manage, forecast, control and monitor
production and tool management.
Product manager Janne Kivinen says
upgrades to MMS include production planning
and scheduling for external manufacturing
operations such as subcontracting phases –
as external operations in MMS are operations
where the manufacturing is done somewhere
else than locally in the factory.
An example of this kind is heat treatment,
which requires the machined parts to be sent
outside the factory for hardening.
There will also be an improved optional
ERP-interface, giving the possibility to send
part master data information from ERP to
MMS along with more comprehensive
feedback data ow from MMS to ERP
including information about the realised
production hours of each completed order.
Other new capabilities are production lead
time monitoring, as MMS will track realised
production lead times for all completed
orders, support for automatic material pallet
measurement in part-handling applications as
automatic measurement provides ultrareliable
material supply for Fastems robot
applications; and other minor improvements
and xes – under and over the hood of MMS.
Kivinen says these upgrades will bene t
metalworking manufacturers: “The improved
ERP capabilities enable seamless integration
of MMS to the existing ERP systems allowing
more ef cient and reliable production
planning and scheduling.”
“Support for external operations allows
Fastems’ customers to manage their
production in a comprehensive way even
though some of the production phases are
done somewhere else than locally in the own
date work lists machine operators know
which jobs have the highest priorities and
what is the resource situation of each job.”
PRODUCTIVITY BEYOND MACHINE TENDING
At the start of the seminar, Fastems chief
executive of cer (CEO) Mikko Nyman
explained the theme of the online event
‘productivity beyond machine tending’.
“We have come up with the phrase
because of our observations around the
machining industries, where the term
automation is often understood merely as
replacing the operator with a robot, or with a
crane if one is moving pallets,” he says.
Nyman explains that physical automation
is a relevant step when machine shops want
to raise their productivity, but there is much
more to be gained, especially for those
producing low-to-medium batch sizes that vary
over time.
“The big issue ends up being, how to
combine high utilisation of machine tools (low
unit costs) with timely orders given all of the
uctuation in demand (batches), need to
minimise work-in-progress, unexpected
production errors and the challenges in
production resource management?,” he says.
“‘Productivity beyond machine tending’
means automating - in addition to the
“After the improvements
launched in v7.5 MMS will
enable customers even
better to manufacture
the right parts at the
right time. And with
the always up to
Fastems CEO Mikko Nyman says productivity beyond machine tending
means “total manufacturing process optimisation”
A Fastems multi-level fl exible
manufacturing system (FMS)
on the shop fl oor
factory,” he adds.
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