No one wants to spend time making scrap, and automation is one way to avoid or at least minimize quality issues. Rather than spending time making products that aren’t up to specification, operators will make good parts and catch quality issues earlier. 

Manufacturers focus on reducing their operating costs, but cannot afford buying more productive machinery.

It’s time to work toward a smarter factory. One that’s more efficient. Faster. More cost-effective. And enables seamless collaboration between people and machines.

Do you wait until parts break down to repair them? Unscheduled maintenance can lead to extra costs, and even worse – downtime. We hope you can get a glimpse of how to cut down on costs and avoid downtime with these examples of teams getting ahead of equipment failure.

The proverb “time is money” applies to almost every profession today, but especially to manufacturing, and certainly to CNC machining. Lights-out facilities are becoming more prevalent, and the importance of active controls with automated feedback is growing, too.

Creaform has launched the R-Series Productivity Station and the R-Series Autocalibration Kit. Both are key upgrades to its robotic metrology dimensional measurement solution, which offers an efficient alternative to traditional shop-floor CMMs.

Those familiar with the animated comedy The Simpsons may recall that Homer has a once long-lost brother named Herb. While making a valiant effort to pull himself from the gutter, Herb invents a device that will translate a baby’s cries into intelligible language that will tell parents exactly what the baby wants or needs. 

The Quality department of Continental’s Chassis & Safety department recently invested in dual multi-sensor CMMs to revamp the inspection capabilities of their measurement laboratory.

“Your report was fine, but…” Have you heard this statement before?

Jim urges readers to meditate on working smarter, not harder.