Page 30 - MetalForming Magazine May 2022

Fabrication: Press Brake’s Automatic Tool Changer
operation,” shares Matt Pahl, the com- pany’s vice president. “That’s a luxury we no longer have, and we don’t see a pipeline of operators on the horizon. While we continue to train our per- sonnel, we cannot do so quickly enough to replace the level of skill that we’ve lost in recent years.”
Excessive Setup Times
This lack of skill on the shop floor translates into press brake setup times hovering around 30 min./job—accept- able, perhaps, in some cases where part volumes are relatively high and operators may only need to set one or two jobs/shift, but on shorter-run jobs, and in particular prototype work, 30- min. setups won’t cut it.
To address its setup-time challenge, as well as down-skill press brake setup and operation, Diamond Metal Prod- ucts recently replaced a 15-yr.-old press brake with a state-of-the-art Amada HRB 1003 model, equipped with Amada’s automatic tool changing (ATC) system. The ATC enables job change- overs in as little as 2 to 3 min.
“We can run 10 times the number of jobs on this new press brake per shift compared to our other machines,” Pahl says, noting that management schedules only shorter-run production jobs of five to 50 parts on the new brake, and programs it offline so as to not interrupt production for pro- gramming.
“Designing our processes for the press brake is a collaboration between the engineers in the office and the oper- ators on the floor,” Pahl continues. “This collaborative process gets our people more involved and fosters team- work, whereas before the engineers would create the flat blanks and send them to the shop where the operators would have to figure out how to form them. Now, the engineers work hand in hand with the operators to devise the most efficient bend sequences, which, I can tell you, the operators on the shop floor don’t mind at all. Yes, they still must manually set up the
other machines, so they must continue to learn, but they certainly enjoy the opportunity to come into the office and help with programming. I feel like these blue-collar positions, then, are evolving more into white-collar jobs.
“And, that collabora- tion,” adds Pahl, “notice- ably has streamlined the time it takes to achieve first-part quality objectives. In effect, we’ve moved near- ly all of the required expert- ise in press brake and tool- ing setup to the engineering and programming office, and have allowed our oper- ators to focus on handling the material. The impact on productivity is significant.”
Controller Interface an Operator’s
Best Friend
Diamond Metal Products recently replaced a 15-yr.-old press brake with this Amada HRB 1003 ATC (automatic tool changing) model. The ATC enables job change- overs in as little as 2 to 3 min. “and noticeably has streamlined the time it takes to achieve first-part quality objectives,” says company vice president Matt Pahl. “In effect, we’ve moved nearly all of the required expertise in press brake and tooling setup to the engineer.
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The HRB 1003 press
brake itself (rated to 110
tons, with a 10-ft. maximum bend length, 9.8-in. stroke and 27.5-in. back- gauge range) boasts several useful, pro- ductivity-enhancing features as stan- dard, including a control with a built-in barcode reader, six-axis backgauge sys- tem, adjustable crowning and three- position foot pedal, “a particularly use- ful feature that our operators really appreciate,” Pahl notes, “during stage bending where we set up multiple tools along the bed of the machine. We really try to form complete parts in one cycle on the press brake, using a progres- sive-die setup, and the operators appre- ciate not having to drag the foot pedal along the floor.
“In addition,” Pahl says, “the graph- ical interface on the controller displays each move in the bend sequence to help guide the operator during multi- stage bending.”
The firm’s optimum workpiece size, explains Pahl, is anything less than a
2-ft. square—“there’s no need for a sheet follower,” he says. “In the past we have taken on larger parts but now shy away from that work for ergonomic concerns. Staying within that 2-ft. win- dow—and we have plenty of work that fits that bill—is much easier on our team.”
Training a Breeze
In terms of training the workforce to work with the new press brake, “Amada recommends that you take your top press brake operator and turn him into the programmer,” Pahl says. “We also had Amada train our engineer in programming. Training really was quick and simple, as the touchscreen’s machine control is very user-friendly. Training took just a few days; I think our team caught on very quickly.”
The ATC features multi-axis manip- ulators that pick and place punches and dies from the machine’s tool