NCBrain helps mould maker reduce 30% cycle time
Job shop is one segment that is growing rapidly in India and future also looks promising. As various industry leaders look forward to outsource their machining activities from job shops, a lot more is expected to happen in this segment. One such company that is keen to deliver their best in order to tap the opportunity is Mechasoft.
Mechasoft was established near Kolhapur (M.S) India in 2004. The company manufactures pressure die casting dies for aluminium & zinc, foundry tooling’s and precision auto components. Thereby offering a complete solution to customers in automotive & machine tool industries. It has modern facility that is equipped with high-end CNC machines like Makino, Haas, DMG Mori, Sodick with sophisticated CAD/CAM solutions. “We believe in investing in technology. It has been our aim to deliver high end solution, and for that one needs to have the proper and latest technologies in place,” says Mr. Tushar Kulkarni.
The Challenges
Challenges and opportunities go hand-in-hand, any kind of opportunities will have its own set of challenges too. The Indian manufacturing industry, since last years, is growing rapidly and generating enough demands for machine tools and mould makers. Mechasoft was no exception, the company was growing and even had received overseas orders. It was during 2016 when the orders were increasing for Mechasoft, equipped with high end machines and sophisticated software’s, had even received orders from overseas market. Even though Mechasoft was well equipped with all the needed technologies, Mr. Tushar Kulkarni was looking to enhance the speed of the machining process and reduce overall cycle time in order to cater to the global demand and match the quality standard.
“Speed and productivity is driving the demand for mould manufacturers and I feel it is key in any business. Day-by-day the development & manufacturing time is reducing and quality is getting enhanced, it becomes challenging for mould manufacturers. Reducing the cycle time while maintaining the quality and keeping the cost low is the biggest challenge mould makers are facing these days. Since many years we are exporting the moulds to USA where development time & cost of moulds are reducing. The only way to tackle this challenge is to reduce your milling cycle time & increase the speed of assembly in final stage,” says. Mr. Tushar Kulkarni.
The Solutions
Since the challenges at Mechasoft was well defined, reduce milling cycle time and increase the speed of assembly, Mr. Kulkarni was looking for solution that can help him tackle these challenges. It was during January 2017 when exports had taken new highs at Mechasoft, the company started looking for solutions that can help them achieve higher precision while reducing the cycle time. It was even more challenging because company already had all the right technologies in place from renowned brands but still was not able to get the desired result. “In 2017 our export customers order increased & that time we strongly felt that we have to increase the speed of milling machines. In March 2017 we visited South Korea & witnessed the actual benefits of NC brain software and was quite impressed with their solutions. Immediately we contacted with India and within 3 weeks we setup the overall system at our facility where all cutting tools, adaptors, software & various roughing & finishing strategies have set by NCBrain,” says Mr. Tushar Kulkarni.
Mechasoft purchased high-end and cost-effective solution NCBrain AICAM from NCBrain India Software Pvt Ltd. NCBrainAICAM is a self-driving concept of artificial intelligence, needs only modeling and leads to safe, fast, and unmanned machining. Just 5 icon-clicking makes it possible not only to do unmanned machining & to reduce machining time but also to increase feed rate & to minimize electrode & to cut down on tools cost. According to Mr. Tushar Kulkarni “NCBrain have provided unique & complete solutions to us as many time mould manufactures purchase latest CAM Softwares, best cutting tools, adaptors & CNC machines but unable to synchronise them with each-others. NCBrain work exactly focus on this issue. The software helps us in synchronising all our machines and softwares leading to unmanned operation.
Benefit observed
- 30% reduction in cycle time
- Enhancement in productivity and quality
- Unmanned operation leading to higher efficiency
- Inventory cost of tools have drastically comes down
After Sales and Service
Sales service plays a major role when a manufacturer purchases a machines or software. To address to its customers, NCBrain always takes an extra effort. They send their application engineer to the customer’s factory to train them and come back only if after the operator is confident. Apart from this they continuously visit them to provide time-to-time training and inform them about the new updates.
“For such futuristic software, customers are always worried about the after sales service and training. I appreciate NCBrain’s work in India, the team here has helped us setup software within a week. I really appreciate their effort for training our operators and programmer about the software. I will always recommend NCBrain AICAM software’s to others as I am getting benefit of its unique features,” says Mr. Tushar Kulkarni.
The Outcome
Mechasoft believes in investing in the right technology, from having CNC machines from companies such as DMG MORI, Makino, Haas Automation, Sodick and softwares like AI-CAM from NCBrain, the company is well equipped to tackle the changing market dynamics and manufacture complex parts. With the help of AI-CAM, now, Mechasoft is able to synchronise the entire machining process. This has cut down on the time consumed, tool usage and higher efficiency.
“Our focus was to reduce the tool cost & cycle time on milling machine where AI-CAM-NCbrain have full filled most of the our requirement. India NC-Brain team prove the cycle time & overall performance of software at our end. We have been using the software since a year and have observed overall 30% cycle time reduction which is huge for mould makers. Another important feature we observed in the shop floor is die cutting on machine with ATC (Automatic Tool Changer) & that too in unmanned environment,” concludes Mr. Tushar Kulkarni.
The above shows that the right technology and adequate knowledge can positively impact your overall productivity. It is high time the Indian SMEs think beyond the cost and look at the bigger picture – the right investment today can lead to a brighter future. Mechasoft is one such example of how investment in technology is actually investment in future.
