Etude de cas Synergy 2000

Dayton Reliable Meets Demands of High-Volume Production with SPC

Top-line Benefits Summary:

Real-time production-based decision-making
Elimination of manual calculations and redundant data handling
Paperless storage of quality data
Manufacturing cost reductions
Timely access to data for continual improvement projects

The expansion into new markets has led a Dayton, OH, precision manufacturer into unprecedented level of efficiency and quality through automated statistical process control (SPC).

For more than 50 years, Dayton Reliable Tool & Mfg. Co. has channeled its design/build expertise into traditional small-volume applications as an OEM equipment supplier into the easy-open can end industry. Most recently, however, the opportunity to engage in increased volume production has come from outside its established product line and customer base. Power generation and medical industries comprise Dayton Reliable’s newest markets, manufacturing more complex parts that require critical measurement capabilities at the point of production.

“The parts we manufacture have become increasingly complex, often involving multiple radii and angles to be measured,” says George Kloos, Director of Quality. “Using the latest inspection technology, we’ve defined a point in space where we expect the part to be, and we then measure the deviation from that point on the machine tool using a Renishaw touch probe.”

With more than 200 machine tools at their disposal including EDM and CMMs, Dayton Reliable determined that manual data capture from measurement equipment was highly inefficient—preventing operators from identifying and resolving production problems quickly. The company empowered its operators with the responsibility for making split-second decisions concerning a part run and carrying out the appropriate response whenever process variation becomes excessive.

A real-time SPC software program was the key technology that enabled Dayton Reliable to achieve its goal. Three software vendors were evaluated. One was deemed unsuitable for the shop floor because it did not visually convey process conditions adequately to operators. A second package was eliminated for its lack of real-time functionality. The system that best met Dayton Reliable’s criteria was Synergy 2000™ from Zontec.

Prior to installing Synergy 2000, SPC was performed with a calculator based on pencil and paper records or from printouts obtained from the measuring equipment. That procedure was time-consuming and error-prone. Today, operators watch color-coded status flags over the Windows^® NT network that tell them if the parts they are machining are within engineering tolerance and if the process is in control.   Gages, CMMs, and other measurement tools feed the data into Synergy 2000 automatically. Operators are free of any manual data entry.

The software utilizes a traffic-light analogy to indicate the type of action required from operators: green for a smooth-running process, yellow for the development of undesirable trends, and red for serious process problems. Operators react by making equipment adjustments or taking other corrective actions on the spot.

In addition to the simplicity of the color-keyed process indicators, Dayton Reliable can focus on any one measurement characteristic if they desire. Operators can view control charts or entire spreadsheets with a single click of the mouse. And Kloos can customize the appearance of the program window for operators based on the requirements of each individual part or job.

“We see a huge potential cost avoidance taking place,” notes Kloos. “The savings comes from knowing that a problem exists now instead of later. When you produce a defective part, most companies recognize the waste in material and labor. What people forget about is the amount of time that was consumed producing a bad part. In effect, you reduce your capacity to produce good parts that you can sell. It becomes a matter of lost revenue,” he adds.

The mere fact that Dayton Reliable has moved to a paperless environment is also contributing to their cost savings. “We’re saving time because we don’t have to write things down, says Kloos.   And the software helps us improve our accuracy by recording the correct value, and not a transposed number or a slipped decimal point. We’re using our time better because we don’t have to perform calculations; it occurs simultaneously with the data entry. Later, if we need to evaluate the data, we don’t have to locate the original piece of paper the data was recorded on.”

“The sheer volume of our production data was extreme,” he recalls. In most cases, printed production reports were several inches thick. “The other problem was that it was not stored in any electronically retrievable manner. If you were looking for a trend, needed to analyze a problem or do tracking, you had to re-key all of that data into an application like Exceland then proceed with the analysis. Now it’s in the file and the manufacturing engineer or machining supervisor can refer to it any time.” This is especially important during the measurement and analytical phases of continual improvement projects.

According to Kloos, the Synergy 2000 implementation occurred rapidly. “From the time we had the software installed and the hardware configured, it was a matter of about a day. Then we spent a couple of hours with the operators to explain to them what data they were looking at, when to become concerned and how to respond.”

Users were generally receptive to the new system, but represented two points of view. “Operators who were having to manually record numbers and use a calculator were very pleased that they only had to press a button and instantly see the result of the measurement,” he points out. “The operators using a CMM were a little more reluctant to rely on a status indicator than an actual number. Our employees are very number-oriented people. They’re very precise machinists who take great comfort in their numbers. For them, it was a different mindset, but they soon realized it was a change for them and the company.”

Because most of the company’s bread-and-butter business doesn’t have enough volume to support real-time SPC, Kloos applying valid control data across a commonality of lower-volume parts. “One interesting application looks at variance from nominal as the measurement parameter across like parts and machine tools. Short-run SPC provides additional process information that we didn’t have before we implemented Synergy 2000. We can compare like features of different part numbers from multiple vertical machining centers and wire EDM machines.   Now we can look at the effect of the machining center on the wire machine as well as the part itself.” For example, the location of the pickup holes at wire is critical to the overall stability of the part’s length. Therefore, hole location is a critical SPC parameter that is monitored at the machining center.

In less than nine months, Dayton Reliable has truly demonstrated its commitment to continuous improvement. Whether it’s the more pro-active approach to process variation, the elimination of redundant data handling or cost avoidance, the company is convinced that real-time SPC is helping them grow their business.