As globalization morphs the once intimate face of business, Mom and Pop shops are nostalgic memories and the concept of keeping production local wavers in the face of distant competition that can do it cheaper and faster — if not better.
FEATURES
The countdown is on! It's only a few weeks until the world's most important annual trade fair event of the machine vision industry opens its doors. Then VISION 2012, the international trade fair for machine vision, will celebrate its silver anniversary. And for the first time the large exhibition will take place in the most attractive and largest trade fair hall of Messe Stuttgart, Hall 1.
All plant owners, engineers and operators seek methods to reduce risk, increase operational efficiencies, shorten time to market and continually optimise processes. An integrated engineering link from plant concept to ownership – the digital plant – is set to help satisfy such objectives. With a long-term vision of reducing product launch times by up to 50%, and plant design to construction timescales by over 10%, the advantages of digital plant could deliver clear benefit to important and growing industrial sectors such as energy from waste. Steve Leech from Siemens highlights the thinking behind a unique and radical approach to getting a plant built and operational.
Verifying the security of a digital product is fit for purpose can be an expensive, time-consuming and difficult process for many manufacturers. Having to look at your product both objectively and critically is a big ask and can take the organisation into unfamiliar waters. Then there is the matter of duplicate testing. So risk adverse is today’s market, that some vendors resort to retesting tested goods in order to ensure all contingencies have been met. Given the risks involved, it’s easy to see why. Once a product has gone to market any security breach is likely to cause serious reputational damage and can incur high costs in recompensing retailers and customers and even an ensuing litigation battle between manufacturer and vendor.
When considering the safety of machinery, many manufacturers may ask why they should worry as surely their machinery supplier will take care of all of that? The Health& Safety Executive thinks differently and, in its guide to buying new machinery (INDG271), states that CE marking is not a guarantee of safety, even if “…the supplier or machine manufacturer is claiming that the machinery complies with the law. You still need to check the machine is safe before it is used”.
Ultrasound. It’s often considered a fully-explored field without a future. Level measurement, parking sensors, surveying: these are the main applications that have been thoroughly developed and are most widely used. End of story? Not just yet.
New research, commissioned by the Chartered Quality Institute (CQI) and the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) from the Centre for Economic and Business Research (Cebr), shows that in 2011, quality management practices contributed £90 billion to Gross Domestic Product (GDP), accounting for 6.0% of UK GDP. I
US-born company owner and CEO Allan Edwards has infused the firm with a new, process-obsessed culture, with one of the most important areas being quality. FGP are reducing the annual scrap rate by rigorously applying best practice and by employing the latest technology from Renishaw, which now includes the addition of a PH20 5-axis touch trigger head system for co-ordinate measuring machines (CMMs), an Equator shop floor gauging system, and a QC20-W wireless ballbar.
The Swiss company Jet Aviation AG, one of the leading business aviation services companies in the world, called upon Creaform’s 3D Engineering Services to 3D model the interior of an empty Boeing 737-800 aircraft. The objective was to get a virtual representation of the interior, where Jet Aviation would ultimately install the interior that it would design and manufacture.
Modern tools & techniques such as Lean and Six Sigma are well known to bring significant improvement in operations and to reduce costs, and there are many notable success stories across most industry sectors. However, frequently they fail to address serious quality problems caused by human error. Overcoming human frailty present within various operational processes continues to be a challenge and one that requires special consideration.
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