Machine operating times increased by up to 30%

Therefore, the logical next step was to carry out an in-depth review of the company's current efficiency and productivity levels in order to prepare it for the future. The goals of the initial project were to increase operational capacity, reduce lead times, continually monitor quality levels and reduce setup times as well as the number of manual activities.

This integration enabled the existing data structures and vertical eroding parameters as well as all the measuring points and presettings to be automatically transferred. Automated quality assurance is now a reality thanks to the CERTA CAD integration and CERTA QMeasure including chip identification functionality. The process for measuring palletized electrodes and workpieces is now fully automated, and the measurement data is written back to the central CERTA system and prepared for subsequent production steps.

The second phase involved connecting toolcraft's processing centers with the CERTA system. Two Zeiss Contura measuring machines, one exeron 5-axis milling machine, one exeron 3-axis milling machine, four exeron EDM machines and one EROWA Robot Multi ERM were integrated into the automatic production process. All the processing machines are fitted with a CERTA JobManager and automatic chip identification, and are connected to the central CERTA system.

For the very first time, the company was able to control the flow of parts centrally. There has been a sustainable reduction in throughput times for individual orders, leading to an increase in the overall production capacity. As a result of the project implementation, toolcraft was able to increase machine running times by up to 30%.

Construction has been seamlessly integrated with production and the measuring process is now automated. Input errors have been eliminated, which has resulted in a sustainable increase in quality levels. All in all, the project marked an important step towards the future.