Page 38 - MetalForming January 2012

Learn how die-change time dropped from 2 hr. to less than 30 min. at overhead garage-door manufacturer Steel-Craft Door Products. Payback for its quick-die-change system came in less than 6 months.
BY BRAD F. KUVIN, EDITOR
Averts Manhandling of Heavy Dies
The 325,000-sq.-ft. production facility of Steel-Craft Door Prod- ucts, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, fabricates overhead garage doors along a pair of 300-ft.-long coil- fed continuous-flow lines. The lines— one geared toward production of resi- dential garage doors and the other for commercial buildings—simultaneously feed prepainted galvanized steel from a pair of 10,000-lb.-lb. coils as wide as
36 in. The stock from the two coils, 0.017 to 0.025 in. thick, feed parallel along the line and undergo forming operations, then come together near the end of the line where they’re clinched together sandwiching a layer of insulating polyurethane foam. The assembly then feeds through a curing tunnel and to a cutoff saw to be cut to length.
Among the forming operations used to add strength and style to the garage- door panels are roll embossing, roll- forming and stamping. For several years Steel-Craft offered three basic styles of doors, requiring three differ- ent die sets for its in-line press—a hydromechanical model with 30- by 55-in. bed. In 2009, to meet market demand for more styles, the company introduced two new styles and built an additional two die sets to accommo- date. At the same time, it faced increased pressure to shorten produc- tion runs and change out the die sets more frequently.
“Excessive changeover time on the presses as well as growth in orders suddenly meant we either had to add a third production line, run a lot of overtime or add a weekend shift,”
Press
One of two 300-ft.-long continuous dual-coil-fed lines that produce garage doors at Steel-Craft Door Products. Positioned in the middle of the line is a hydromechanical stamping press, with 30- by 55-in. bed, that forms decorative features to the outer door panel.
36 MetalForming/January 2012
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