Page 26 - MetalForming January 2014

The LuK pressroom houses five transfer presses and six progressive-die presses, including a 125-metric-ton Bruderer press (bottom right) that turns out torque- converter blades at 400 strokes/min. The newest addition to the pressroom is a 2900-metric-ton Schuler transfer press (right), which includes (shown) a four-sta- tion stacking system. Stamped parts will stack in the two center stations, and a robot will lay cardboard pieces, stacked on the two outer stations, onto the part stack as needed to protect the parts from damage.
“We Put a Press
Where We Had
No Business
Doing So”
24
MetalForming/January 2014
www.metalformingmagazine.com
So says Paul Gray, manager, stamping at LuK USA, who explains why he located a new high-speed mechanical press in an area that others questioned, and how he addressed their concerns
BY BRAD F. KUVIN, EDITOR
Torque-converter stamping and assembly is booming at the Scha- effler LuK USA manufacturing facility in Wooster, OH. The plant’s stamping capacity has been pushed to the limit thanks to rapidly growing order volumes. We’re talking 8000 torque converters/day assembled and shipped, and more than 900,000 stamped parts/day.
Several new presses have been brought in to increase stamping capac- ity, and numerous lean initiatives have been enacted to help the company return to a five-day three-shift opera- tion. All of that’s a breath of fresh air to
Gray and others, having operated the plant around the clock, 24/7, for the last couple of years.
Squeezing Every Ounce from OEE
In one corner of the plant’s sprawl- ing campus sits the 11-press press- room, where 70 of its 1300 employees work. “We run as efficiently as possi- ble,” says Gray. “And we don’t work on our dies while they’re installed in the presses. Dies requiring maintenance move promptly to the toolroom—we get them out of the press and get a new die in there, as soon as possible.”