CIMdata PLM Industry Summary Online Archive
18 September 2007
Implementation Investments
Stanzwerk AG Speeds Tool Design and Production with CoCreate Software
CoCreate Software, Inc. announced that Stanzwerk AG cut its development time in half for its tool design and parts production using the CoCreate OneSpace Suite.
The Swiss company, headquartered in Unterentfelden, produces components for electric motors and transformers. Stanzwerk engineers use CoCreate OneSpace Modeling to design the stamping tools, die-casting molds and equipment that shape the components.
The company employs 230 staff and reported revenues of euro 50 million last year, 85 percent of which came from exports. Germany is by far the most important foreign market for the Swiss company. Customers include well-known ventilator manufacturers, manufacturers of power tools and system suppliers for the automotive industry.
"Cost pressures and time to market challenge us the most," says Andre Kissling, the company's Head of Technology. "Not only do we have to develop and produce our tools quickly to shorten production times and lower costs, but we also need to constantly refine our manufacturing processes."
Stanzwerk has risen admirably to the challenge. Company engineers have mastered stamping technology, even with very narrow parts with the smallest of diameters, and can reliably produce millions of such pieces. To do that, the Swiss technology leader banks on the CoCreate OneSpace Modeling and CoCreate OneSpace Model Manager software to speed tool design and map ever more complex die-casting molds.
The CoCreate OneSpace Suite simplifies reuse of existing designs and also offers support for the development of new tools and processes thanks to its Dynamic Modeling based approach to product development. Designers can split work on models during the detailing phase and later merge them regardless of the creation history and parametrical dependencies.
In the recent past, the company put a new, highly automated assembly line for aluminum casting into operation. A robot arm puts six laminations simultaneously into one master mold. The mold's elements can be changed on the machine within 20 minutes. According to Kissling, it would have been impossible to map the automation of the casting process in 2D. Today, the company can cast twice as many laminations as in the past, and at a lower cost -- a competitive advantage which directly translates into more orders.
Stanzwerk can now develop more complex molds than most of the competition with OneSpace Modeling. At the same time, production has been noticeably accelerated. "We halved production time because we design more quickly and the toolmaker can visualize the form a lot better in 3D, which means little need for rework due to ambiguities in the production process."
OneSpace Modeling and OneSpace Model Manager are core components of the CoCreate 3G PLM solution for streamlined product development. It differs from the monolithic PLM systems of other providers due to its modular structure, its openness for integration into an existing IT environment using standards such as XML and Web services, and its Dynamic Modeling based approach to product development, which enables users to modify 3D CAD models without any prior knowledge of the creation history and dependencies.
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