Dumur Industries
Seven-axis plasma cutter creates new opportunity for Saskatchewan custom fabricator
July 7, 2010
Unique seven-axis plasma cutter lets this custom manufacturer bevel-cut thick plate.
Walking through the shop at Dumur Industries, White City, Sask., you will see the processes that are pretty typical in shops all across the country. Press brakes are bending metal, welders are joining metal, punching machines are banging away, and the company’s mills and lathes are creating chips.
As you continue the tour, however, you come to a cell unlike any other at the company, perhaps unlike any other in the country, and enter the world of seven-axis movement.
“We are a military contractor and we needed something that was unique in the industry and that allowed us to bevel-cut heavy plate,” explained President Bob Dumur. “Even though this is a new fabricating cell for us, it’s not totally foreign because of the work we have done with our five-axis laser cutter and in five-axis machining. Our world is three-dimensional work.”
A little more than a year ago, Dumur started the buying process by investigating and then helping to design a custom fabricating cell for his company. The result was a Hypertherm high-definition plasma cutter attached to a Fanuc robot that can articulate in seven axes.
The created cell, 24 by 9 by 9 ft., is capable of cutting heavy plate more than 2 in. thick.
“We already have a five-axis laser cutter that we love to make parts on, but with the plasma, cutting material like aluminum is just much easier and much, much faster,” said Dumur.
Also, thicker materials can be cut on the plasma, especially during beveling applications.
“As you turn 3/4-in. material on an angle to make a bevel cut, it actually becomes a much longer cut,” said Dumur. “The plasma can make this cut quickly and easily, not like some other techniques.”
The Beginning
Dumur Industries’ history begins in 1987 when the company specialized in the sheet metal production work found in the ventilation, cabinetry, and food preparation industries. Then, in 1997 it expanded into the defense, oil and gas, power utility, and communications sectors.
Today the company is best-known as a precision metal manufacturing specialist serving the ground vehicle defense market.
The company’s 63,500-sq.-ft. facility has been dedicated mostly to manufacturing and production, with the exception of 5,000 sq. ft. set aside for computer programming and administration.
In-house design, machining, punching, pressing, forming, cutting, and welding allow the company to supply its customers with turnkey-style production. This means that parts can be simple, such as washers and brackets, or very complex assemblies and completed products. Lot sizes can range from one to several thousand.
Dumur cites sound business practices, his company’s ISO standard, and a dedication to producing parts that are both high-quality and on time as reasons for the company’s success.
Over the years Dumur Industries has developed an internal quality assurance system, became ISO 9001:2000-registered, and operated in a manner to meet the requirements of QS-9000 standards. The company also has a 5S discipline program, statistical process control, and lean manufacturing processes.
More than 100 people now work at this contract manufacturer, and as the technology in the shop gets more complex, the skilled trade workers become more important.
“A piece of equipment is just a lump of steel without our skilled trades workers. They are our biggest assets,” said Dumur.
Adding Equipment
Purchasing decisions are never easy, but when you need to create a variety of parts for a number of industries, the decision can be even more difficult.
“We are a contract manufacturer, so when I look at a piece of equipment I look for equipment that can do a wide variety of work,” said Dumur. “Because there are not too many of this type of setup around in the world, it gives us a competitive advantage. There are many shops that have flat plasma machines, but this is a step way above that.”
The downside occurs when the company’s customers don’t know what this type of technology can bring to their fabrication needs.
“You have to get the word out. And as you do that the customer learns what the machine is capable of,” said Dumur.
And it’s not only the company’s customers who are getting an education in seven-axis machining.
“We look at our parts a lot differently now because we are able to do work in seven axes,” explained Dumur. “We can create parts from scratch on this machine, and we can also put semifinished parts on it in order to cut holes in them, for example.”
This new manufacturing ability allows Dumur Industries’ designers to create parts now in one setup, improving quality and increasing throughput.
“It opens a whole new market for us and a new process method that our salesmen need to understand in order to bring work into the shop. Then it is up to our designers and programmers,” said Dumur.
Sales, design, and manufacturing all must now be rethought thanks to the addition of robotic processing.
Robotic Capability
The combination of the software, hardware, and offline programming and simulation capability is a unique setup. The addition of the robot to the equation makes programming more important than in an application with no robot. The more precise the programming is, the more precisely the robotic arm moves.
“In most cases, such as with robotic welding, there is a lot of touch-up work that needs to be done after the robot is finished,” said Dumur. “In our setup we have calibrated the cell so that what you see on the screen during the programming phase is exactly what happens during production.”
While the company did not exactly perform trial-and-error experimentation during the initial installation phase, the integration has been a complicated process.
“There were not a lot of examples of this type of technology in the marketplace for us to learn from, so we really had to jump in with both feet,” said Dumur.
The cell is not going to be limited to plasma.
In the future, if the company wants to add a fiber laser system, router, or even a paint gun to the end of the robotic arm, the transition will come much easier. Already a complex manufacturing cell, there is still more that the company can get out of it.
“The migration to new, advanced technologies will be made easier because we have already dealt with all of the motion issues of the robot that come up with that many axes in high-tolerance work,” said Dumur.
Now Dumur’s machinists can also download some of the work currently being processed on other machines to the robotic cell, such as adding holes to a part by plasma cutting rather than by a machining process.
Programming, Simulation
Parts are programmed offline and then simulated to ensure the accuracy of the robot’s movements.
“Simulation is mandatory,” said Dumur. “Without the software that we have we wouldn’t be making parts in this cell at all.”
When the company began using robotic processing in its shop in 2003 with the addition of a five-axis, gantry-style laser robot, it was programmed with CENIT FASTTRIM® built on the DELMIA V5 robotics platform.
With the addition of this hardware and software, the company was able to cut holes in an aluminum air reservoir tank with the 3-D laser cutter, creating seven or eight holes within 30 seconds. Previously the holes had to be machined on milling equipment, taking up to 40 minutes to produce, not including the individual setup time and the difficulties of machining thin-walled aluminum components.
Now the company is also applying CENIT FASTCURVE® software to the seven-axis plasma cutting cell.
A major advantage of the simulation capability is offline programming, which allows the company to program its robotic systems accurately without tying up physical resources on the factory floor.
“The level of complexity in programming a complicated system like this could not be accomplished efficiently without simulating and offline programming in a virtual 3-D world,” said Dumur.
It is this type of thinking that is helping Dumur Industries stay competitive in today’s manufacturing climate.
“Even after 22 years we still want to be known for leading-edge technology,” said Dumur.
For more information, visit www.dumurindustries.com.
What Can a Robot Do for You?
Canadian Industrial Machinery asked Dassault Systemes Robotics Specialist Tony Karew to explain the application of robotic processing, simulation, and offline programming.
CIM: Is it necessary to simulate a process before it is run on the shop floor?
Karew: Simulating a process can ultimately mean the difference between success and disaster. The more that an engineer knows about a process, the easier the implementation stage will go.
Simulation allows engineers to use 3-D to see into the future of their designs and establish important milestones in their project early on. They can validate things like the robot’s reach, cycle time, throughput, and design intent.
Finding problems with these things after the cell is built is very costly and time-consuming to fix. It can also delay your launch. Using simulation allows the engineer to see not only the product he is producing, but also the tooling design being used along with the process being implemented.
Using simulation allows existing production lines to be modified easily so they can accommodate new products. Simulating new processes on top of old ones keeps the production line running while all the engineering for the new product takes place.
CIM: How does simulation save actual production time?
Karew: The use of RRS [realistic robot simulation] allows the production rate to be validated in the simulation so there are no surprises regarding a robot’s cycle time when system start-up arrives.
CIM: Why is programming offline so important?
Karew: Offline programming allows all the robot processes to be programmed or reprogrammed without using the actual robot, so engineers can be programming a robot while it is still in production.
CIM: Does a part’s size matter in robotic applications?
Karew: Not at all. There are many applications where robots are used for the production or assembly of small or large parts. Emerging markets in robotics [such as small-batch manufacturing] are also realizing the benefits of using robotic simulation.
CIM: What can the addition of a robot to a process mean for a shop?
Karew: When a company implements robotics or automation, it becomes part of their intellectual property and changes the way they produce. If they are competitive, they will learn and grow their processes to prosper into new domains.
Once they become fluent in the technology that they implement, a company can easily modify an existing robot process, or implement a new robot to accommodate a new product or enter a new market.
CIM: How can a shop identify the need for advanced software?
Karew: Working within a simulation program can allow shops to experiment with and apply complex technologies that would be difficult to render otherwise. DELMIA offers customers the ability to author a production process digitally.
Each process can be modified in any number of ways to explore multiple “what if” scenarios that a manufacturer can use in production. This reusability of processes allows a company to be competitive and utilize their resources to their fullest capability and gain further ROI on their capital investment.
For more information, visit www.3ds.com.
