A total transformation

Hexagon’s Smart Factory Manager (SFM) centrally digitizes all aspects of its production environment and support systems, from forecasting and capacity planning through shop floor control, quality, work instructions, shop orders, materials, tooling, and more. Images: Hexagon

The focus on data-driven manufacturing is forcing many to rethink how they produce components. And this was certainly true for Hexagon’s Quonset Point Factory in North Kingstown, R.I.

About five years ago, Steve Ilmrud, vice-president of operations, and his team embarked on a journey to evaluate the company’s processes and perform process improvements. However, it was important for Ilmrud to utilize any software or hardware technology that Hexagon has acquired or developed over the years in its own manufacturing facilities.

“We wanted to be adopters of our own technology,” said Ilmrud. “We wanted to see how our CMMs could be used to produce critical components for those same CMMs.”

The goal of the project was continuous improvement with an eye on digital transformation. And the starting point was finding a manufacturing execution system (MES) that could link to the company’s enterprise resource planning (ERP) system and work across all areas of the factory floor.

The Search for MES

Hexagon didn't have an overarching system to help it organize and optimize its production processes. The existing ERP system was more focused on inventory and financials but didn’t have the scope to explore production-related data gathering.

“We did test drive several MES systems from different companies and nothing quite met our needs,” said Ilmrud. “We went to internal development for a tool and spent the past couple years developing Smart Factory Manager (SFM), which has become our new MES system. It centrally digitizes all aspects of our production environment and support systems, from forecasting and capacity planning through shop floor control, quality, into work instruction, shop orders, materials, tooling, and more.”

When implementing MES, it’s not just about the system itself. To get the best data, it’s important to stop and look at all parts of the production process and make sure that everything is optimized and streamlined as much as possible. Hexagon took the time to look at its own processes and how it could make things better. What it found were a few areas where optimization was needed.

Smart Factory Manager

SFM looks at real-time labour analysis, efficiencies, throughputs, process delays, process productivity, quality issues, and on-time delivery of suppliers, while providing real-time dashboards and metrics as a result of the latest technology.

“We're still trying to tweak the system and improve it so that we are looking at the most important metrics,” said Ilmrud. “Then the tricky part is you've now collected all this information, but then the challenge becomes how to utilize that data in the most actionable way? It is easy to be overwhelmed by all the data. The continuous improvement journey is never done, but we've made great progress. I'd say in the past five years we have been instrumental in making many great and tangible improvements to our operation.”

One unintended outcome of implementing SFM was that it allowed the factory to go completely paperless. Ilmrud noted that he started off his career about 30 years ago at United Technologies Pratt & Whitney, and back then everything was done on paper. Whether it was paper travellers or stamp-offs, all the documentation needed for the industry was in paper form.

Hexagon used its own Leica BLK 360 scanner to collect data and develop a digital twin of its manufacturing spaces.

“About six months ago, we had one of our vendors come in and he made a comment about how there was no paper on the shop floor, and that really struck me,” said Ilmrud. “We didn't set out to, but all the different technologies we've utilized have now really eliminated paper.”

Today, all the shop floor workers have a tablet or computer and when they come to work in the morning, it welcomes them and presents all the jobs that are in a worker’s queue. It tells them what is up next and presents them with the work instructions for those jobs.

This digitization of work instructions has also provided additional benefits. As the worker goes through the build process, the SFM system has built-in queries or questions regarding visual and dimensional inspections to collect in-process data.

“It empowers all the people on the shop floor,” said Ilmrud. “Whether it is a part shortage or a quality problem, a worker is able to hit a button, type some comments either on the supply or the quality side, and the appropriate group or people can be notified quickly and react in real time to a problem on the shop floor.”

The Three Ps

Ilmrud, who is responsible for all the manufacturing in North America, believes that all worries can be broken down into one of three categories: people, parts, and process. SFM has enabled the company to address all three aspects by drilling down to any issues and finding ways to better address them.

On the people side, today’s workforce is multi-generational. People range in age, experience, and technical acumen.

“We’ve got to be cognizant of the fact that just handing a tablet to someone who is near retirement may not be as easy as say a millennial worker who is very familiar with the technology; it may not be a natural fit,” said Ilmrud. “You’ve got to design your tools and your products in a way that it can be quickly adopted and embraced. If you don't keep that in mind, you'll have great technology you won't be able to implement.”

On the part side, most of the challenges, especially in the past couple years, have been along the lines of supply chain and logistic. Technology has helped Hexagon quite a great deal in those areas.

“We have been able to communicate and build closer coordination with our suppliers,” he said. “We knew our needs, and we had insights into their production processes as well so that if they're seeing a problem coming at them, we can prepare for that problem and support them and become true partners.”

On the process side, before SFM, Hexagon had printed work instructions. For the most part, it was hard to get workers to look at the work instructions, let alone follow them. With the new digital technology, workers have the tablet in front of them and must go through all pages on the tablet to get the instructions they need

The company wanted to see how its CMMs could be used to produce critical components for those same CMMs. They did this by collecting data and creating a digital thread from the machining process to the final machine performance at a customer site.

“They'll need to actually input data in order to proceed in the process,” said Ilmrud. “We can ensure that they're looking at the work instructions and entering the required process variables we've asked for. If there is a change to those work instructions, which happens all the time, we can proactively make them aware of that change because it won't allow them to continue until they've read and acknowledged that things have changed since the last time they were on the job. That's been very powerful, the ability to ensure that the work instructions are being utilized in a proper way.”

Digital Transformation

One of the big things that Hexagon tried to do was use its own products on the factory floor to help enhance manufacturing of other product components.

“We have software for design and engineering of products which is used at the very beginning of the product life cycle,” said Ilmrud. “These are analytical tools that the engineers use to optimize design. Then we have a set of CAD/CAM software technologies that build on those designs to develop and optimize machining processes. These products, such as ESPRIT and SURFCAM, include CNC simulation and CNC cutter path optimization.

For example, with ESPRIT, Hexagon was able to create digital models of its machine tools and fixturing. It was able to prove out, write, and conduct improvement activities without downtime by using the digital twins. Because of this, the company saw a 15 per cent improvement in machining cycle times.

“We integrated a number of tools around the hardware, which collects process data throughout the machining and assembly process,” said Ilmrud. “We then used PC-DMIS and other software to aggregate the data.”

For example, the company used its own “Absolute” portable-arm CMM to collect dimensional measurement data and connected it to its own PC-DMIS and Q-DAS software. From there they were able to take the SPC data and use it in its Lean Six Sigma/Green Belt Project, which identified correlations between machine part precision with CMM performance. With this project, the facility saw a 50 per cent improvement in secondary operation throughput.

“As we collected this data in our machine process, we embarked on a journey to develop a digital thread this year,” said Ilmrud. “Taking data from our machining process, we machine critical components for our CMMs and then those parts are used in our assembly process to assemble CMMs. We began to connect the digital thread from the machining process to the final machine performance at a customer site. We have these databases that allow us to explore changes we want to make in a machining process, for example, making a part more or less precise. From there, we can see what impacts those changes will have on the longevity, performance, and the cost of the product at the customer end.”

A digital thread links the data from design through the manufacturing process to the performance and delivery of the product to the customer. But it also has the closed-loop component, where the data collected is then used to improve the process. Using NCSIMUL and ESPRIT, all the way through the data collection and SPC software, made the digital thread possible at Hexagon.

“For example, we were able to execute and implement NCSIMUL to simulate our manufacturing and machine process,” said Ilmrud. “This allows us to do simulations of the cutter paths, make sure we don't have any collisions, and we can run a digital twin of the simulated process to predict how the actual process will run. We can make tweaks to that digital twin to then estimate how the process will run in reality. This limits downtime as all the programming analysis can be done off-line, so you're not affecting the throughput of all your machining processes. That’s a good example of a true digital thread that we've established from process to product to customer performance.”

Beyond the digital thread, the company focused on developing a digital twin, which can be used to take that as designed and compare it to that as built, programmed, or machined.

Hexagon used its own Leica BLK 360 scanner to collect data and develop a digital twin of its manufacturing spaces. From there it was able to create simulated factory layouts, simulate and improve the environment, and develop rapid CAD modelling.

“Digital twins allow us to look at how well we were producing components and simulate improvements to that process,” said Ilmrud. “We can do this all off-line, which means that we weren’t taking time out of our production process. We didn't set out to transform our organization to be digital. Instead, we wanted to find ways to be better and more efficient. Along the way we took actions that were appropriate to improve our processes, which in effect was digitization. It's all about looking at your process and embarking on the journey of continuous improvement and utilizing technology efficiently. There's so much technology available. In the end, the digital twin and digital thread ended up being two pillars that we used to guide our process of improvement.”

Associate Editor Lindsay Luminoso can be reached at lluminoso@canadianmetalworking.com.

Hexagon's Manufacturing Intelligence division, hexagon.com/company/divisions/manufacturing-intelligence