CNC West Oct Nov Web

30 www.CNC-West.com CNC WEST October/November 2018 Efficiency and productivity are key concepts that lead to profitability in any production environment…especially in the machine shop. In my time studies and organizational reviews, I have noticed that one of the greatest determi- nants of productivity is set-up or changeover times. This interval is dead time when no chips are being generated. It is the time when the engine is idling and the car is going nowhere. Developing strategies to reduce this idle period is one significant way to improve productivity and efficiency without capital investment. In this article, 6 action points will be presented. 1. Coordination Most machining jobs are done on CNC today. This Set-up Reduction Strategies By Michael Near - Drop-N-Go means that there must be a program, a workholding method, a tool list and inspection points. These elements each require different thought processes and usually different people to perform each part of the overall job. Regular planning meet- ings gather all participants into the same room so a vision and job outline can be developed. Refinement of concept during these meetings leads to better understanding of the challeng- es that are inherent in every new job. It has been proven that people perform better and things operate with much more efficiency when everybody knows where they are going and how they will get there. Coordinated planning and strategy development provides the common understanding required to foresee pitfalls before they become nightmares. 2. Organization The efficient shop is organized. Military people know this because the adage of “a place for everything and everything in its place” pays big dividends. Knowing where a tool or fix- ture is eliminates the hunt and gather phase of set-up. I have seen tool racks with identified locations for each tool. All fixtures have unique locations and even cutting tool kits are allocated to specific part numbers and stored in an organized manner. In this type of shop, anybody can put their hands on any set-up element quickly and repeatedly. Just knowing that things are where they should be is a great benefit and stream- lines the process while reducing frustrations. 3. Tool Library Many programmers will start programming with Tool #1 to create a prominent feature on the part. Moving on to the second feature, the next tool is numbered #2. While this is a straightforward numbering convention, it adds confusion when each program different tools numbered 1, 2, 3 thru to the end of the program. Many errors have occurred when (for example) tool #6 was not changed from one program to another. The wrong tool in the machine causes terrible prob- lems. One excellent solution is to have each tool commonly used assigned to a unique identifier number. As an example, almost all jobs have tapped holes. One strategy is to have all taps numbered with values starting at 2000 thru 2999. All tap drills can start with 3000 thru 3499.