Single item manufacturer relies on MDE
Ringhoffer GmbH in 72664 Kohlberg as the leading manufacturer of toothed racks in small to medium-sized series mainly produces single or sample parts on the basis of customer drawings.
More than 60 exclusively CNC-controlled machines which mill, dovetail, turn, grind, groove, clear, and drill are produced. Many years of cooperation with sub-suppliers for hardening and nitriding round off the range of Ringhoffer’s products.
The increasing number of production orders has made it increasingly more complex to constantly monitor machines, to promptly react to malfunctions, and to be able to eliminate them. Management has desired to further enhance the quality standard that had been established in over 50 years. Because of the regional lack of highly qualified skilled workers, a software solution was wanted which would not only help to improve delivery reliability but would also increase the machines’ capacity-utilization with optimal assignment of the decreasing number of skilled personnel.
Only the fully automated monitoring of all machines could relieve master craftsmen and foremen and give them more time to solve problems and eliminate malfunctions. Ringhoffer, for example, decided in the autumn of 2006 to install an integrated machine-data-acquisition. In addition to an innovative technology, the connection to the ERP system infor:COM was defined as a prerequisite for this. The decision was made in favor of the successful MDE system INCLUDIS.factory of the Berlin software provider comtas software consulting GmbH which was installed in cooperation with SGP GmbH and successfully introduced in 2007.
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The aim was to integrate all 60 CNC-machines into the existing IT landscape within a few weeks, to represent them in the MDE solution, and to monitor running and downtimes automatically. In addition, deviations from the target and setup times were to be immediately determined and reported to the master craftsman or foreman in charge. In order to be able to pass on this information in real-time to the person in charge, independent of the department in which he momentarily is, the use of mobile BDE devices was decided upon. All fault reports are immediately transferred to these devices so that the master craftsman or foreman is able to react promptly. He can immediately recognize which machine has gone into the “malfunction” condition und directly go there.
This method of the transmission of the malfunction information is highly effective especially since production is distributed over several floors and to another production hall across the street. Ringhoffer is currently using 8 BDE devices to transmit current information to all master craftsmen and foremen. Flexible allocation of the machines to master craftsmen and foremen controls the transmission of the messages to the right person.
In addition to the transmission of malfunction messages, mobile barcode scanners are used for more than 1,200 registrations of setup and processing times a day. Deviations from the target time are immediately displayed by the system and offer the unique opportunity to analyze the cause of error directly at the machine and to find solutions with the participat- ing persons to avoid repeated occurrence.
The BDE devices used are linked via several WLANRouters to the ERP system and are continually online everywhere on the factory premises. The master craftsman and/or foreman in the branch across the street also receive all messages immediately via the WLAN-Router installed there.
With the help of the e-mail/SMS messenger integrated in INCLUDIS.factory, management is immediately informed in the case of production deviations or malfunctions and can then automatically distribute reports and Excel tables to the employees responsible.
The first positive experience from this innovative solution was that deviations between target and actual times were noticeably reduced and the runtime of machines was simultaneously increased. This experience serves the management of Ringhoffer GmbH for setting up a production bonus payment scheme.
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