TPT September 2016

BEND I NG , END FORM I NG & SWAG I NG

New Canada facility and machinery TUBE bending and end-forming technology specialist Addition Manu- facturing Technologies has expanded, with a new, larger facility in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. With a total of 22,500ft 2 , the new location is nearly double the size of the company’s previous Canada location. The additional space will facilitate growth in manufacturing, engineering and research and development. mill, which will be used for production of larger machine components for both Addition customers and for Addition’s other North American locations. “The new facility and equipment allows for the production of larger muffler projects than in the past and significantly increases in-house manufacturing,” said Doug DeVouge, general manager of Addition Canada. “With the expansion into this new state- of-the-art building, Addition has been able to increase production capacity and efficiency of our silencer making product line, and recently landed orders Addition Manufacturing Technologies – USA Website: www.additionmt.com Adapting to new bending requirements In addition to increasing square footage, the company has expanded its manufacturing capabilities with the purchase of a large-capacity boring from various companies worldwide for which we previously may not have had capacity.” The expansion will eventually increase the company’s workforce in Canada. Addition also has manufacturing facilities in the USA, Canada, Mexico, UK, France and China. The company’s products serve the automotive, aerospace, furniture and ship building market segments.

The data is collected at a central location and can be retrieved and analysed in strict compliance with data protection. Statistical information is viewed in real time. The state of the machine and the degree of wear of the tools are permanently transparent. The HMI control panel has also been further optimised. The advanced software with icon interface provides high process reliability and intuitive operation. All operations are clearly arranged and structured. For example, the user finds stylised, meaningful icons for different categories, such as parameters for dimensions, the transport, the tool clamping or guide rails. “This makes the development of bending programs or the input of tool data easier,” explained Bert Zorn, managing director of Schwarze- Robitec. “Moreover, all entries are always inspected for validity, therefore conflicting inputs are prevented.” The CNC NxT 2.0 also includes an advanced user management system. This allows the assignment of different user-levels to employees, from the operation of the tube bending production to complex processes such as production planning, bending equipment and optimisation of the product, or integration into the company’s infrastructure. Schwarze-Robitec GmbH – Germany Fax: +49 221 89008 9920 Email: sales@schwarze-robitec.com Website: www.schwarze-robitec.com

INCREASINGLY sophisticated pro- cesses and the continuous trend for on-demand production characterise the new tube bending manufacturing, with complex geometries of components, new materials and the call for lower unit costs and the simultaneously rapidly changing batch sizes. Production planners must adapt to this situation, and this ultimately increases the demands on machine operators, who must implement changes reliably. Schwarze-Robitec has reacted to thesedevelopmentswithanewoperating concept and the integration of new functions in its CNC-controlled bending systems. As a further development of the NxG control system for bending machines, which was presented last year, NxG 2.0 simplifies and focuses on the essentials of the operating concept and new opportunities in the networking of bending machines, with increased flexibility in the production of bending products. Inorder tomake thebending technology fit for ‘Industry 4.0’, basic modules were integrated into the NxG 2.0 controller. In addition to the standard statistics on bent components, process data can be gathered and evaluated. Integrated sensors provide information on wear values or, for example, the consumption of lubricants, and allow conclusions to be drawn about the expected bending result, the state of the bending tools or the need for maintenance of the machine. This process data is backed up on the corporate network or in the cloud.

With the new NxG 2.0 controller in addition to the standard statistics on bent components, process data can be gathered and evaluated

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S EPTEMBER 2016