New Technologies to Address Die-Shop Challenges

Guest Blogger: Pat Saul

General Manager, RPS Quality Solutions Inc

Today the Die Industry faces multiple challenges. Die shops encounter high demands in both cost and time and must deal with continuously shifting technologies.  

New Materials, Drastic Designs and Late Form Changes, combined with Aggressive Prototype and Quotation Timelines -- all of these create significant issues for Sheet Metal Die Design and Development which are always on the critical path of automotive vehicle programs. Die Suppliers often contend with pressure to deliver Die Designs and Builds to very tightly compressed timelines. 

There are frequently delays in receiving quote packages and product data from the customer, while required delivery dates do not change, which results in reduced turnaround times. Die Suppliers have had to find creative and effective ways to adjust and be successful delivering on time quality dies that produce quality parts. 

Pat Saul, General Manager of RPS Quality Solutions, will illustrate some of the latest technologies that help overcome these challenges at PMA’s Metal Stamping Technology and Tool & Die Conference on December 6 -7, 2016 in Chicago, IL. 

Pat’s presentation will highlight the benefits and savings to be found with the use of cutting edge Morphing Software Solutions and Blue-Light Scanning Technologies -- and the further benefits and synergies realized by Combining and Integrating these two technologies. 

Their presentation will showcase utilization and applications revolving around the experience and expertise of two leading technology & process developers:

1. Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence 

and 

2. Rise-ES.

Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence (HMI) is a leading metrology and manufacturing solution specialist.  HMI’s expertise in Sensing, Thinking and Acting – the Collection, Analysis and Active Use of measurement data – enables customers to increase production speed and accelerate productivity while enhancing product quality.  In our presentation, Hexagon will describe the best known scanning techniques in order to optimize the die try out process and reduce the number of quality loops during the die tryout phase. 

Rise-ES was founded with the vision to develop Engineering Applications that are practical, effective, and easy to integrate into existing processes -- while at the same time improving those processes and the quality and speedy delivery of the process outputs. 

For the Die Industry, Rise-ES provides Omni Transformer -- software based on the Omnicad system for morphing product or manufacturing geometry based on inputs of analysis software tools or scans of actual physical properties. 

As Die Design Shops have successfully adopted simulation tools (such as Autoform, Dynaform, Pamstamp, etc.)  to predict springback, areas of cracking/thinning etc., and also to provide customer feedback for product concessions, these shops have been able to realize improved die and stamped part outputs. 

During the upfront design phase Tool & Die shops can use these simulation/analysis tools in conjunction with OmniTransformer Morphing Software to generate tight simulation loops and to run various “what-if” scenarios, to determine the optimum die face that will produce a stamped part that should mostly closely match the dimensional characteristics of the product design -- and thereby reduce the physical die tryout and tune-in time. 
In this scenario, the outputs of the simulation tools are the inputs for OmniTransformer. 

In addition to creating compensated surfaces based on Simulations, die shops also Combine OmniTransformer with Blue Light Scanning during the physical die tryout phase to rapidly generate CAM cutter paths to modify the die face to address any remaining dimensional deviations. In this scenario, the outputs of the Blue Light Scans are the inputs to the OmniTransformer Morphing Software. 

Pat’s presentation will emphasize these three different areas for the successful implementation of the latest set of technologies:

1) Morphing during Die Design Phase

2) Blue Light Scanning of physical properties once produced

3) Morphing and final refinement of dies based on scans of physical parts produced during tryout