Page 48 - MetalForming July 2013

In Search of the New Age of Quality
bed length) and a pair of material-han- dling robots.
“About half of our press-brake bend- ing is automated,” Nakano told us, “and the goal is to be 80-percent automated by 2014.”
Translating Tacit Knowledge into Explicit Knowledge
Low-volume high-mix production also was on display at the precision sheetmetal job shop of Fukasawa Inc., in Tokyo. Supporting primarily the home electrical-appliance industry (televi- sions, office-automation equipment and telecommunication equipment, for example), the firm specializes in prototype development and 3D mod- eling. This in addition to its full-service fabrication offerings, including laser machining, CNC punching, bending and projection welding. The company categorizes required operator skills into 23 fields, each field with seven grades. Each operator wears a name tag that includes his skill fields and grades.
Our tour started with company pres- ident Masao Kurihara’s eloquent expla- nation of the values not only of the company’s capital equipment but of its knowledgeable and dedicated work- force. The 43-employee 800-million-
Fukasawa Inc. president Masao Kurihara, shown here in front of the firm’s lineup of manual press brakes, 20 to 80 ton capacity, eloquently describes the values not only of the company’s capital equipment but of its knowledgeable and dedicated workforce. Kurihara explained to study-mission participants how the company is transforming its vast bank of “tacit knowledge,” often difficult to pass on to others, into more teachable “explicit knowledge.”
46 MetalForming/July 2013
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yen (US$8.3 million) company is focused, Kurihara says, on transform- ing its vast bank of “tacit knowledge,” often difficult to pass on to others, into “explicit knowledge.”
This challenge, I’m sure, rings true to metalformers around the world. That is: the day to day routines (referred to as “tacit knowledge”) practiced by our most experienced machine operators, like riding a bike or playing the piano, are not easily taught to newer employ- ees entering the metalforming arena.
Conversely, “explicit knowledge”—tech- nical and more academic-based—can more easily be taught and passed along. So the challenge, as Mr. Kurihara explained, is translating and breaking down the tacit knowledge shared by Fukasawa’s more experienced employ- ees into more digestible and teachable bits of explicit knowledge.
Along those lines, our group was privy to a series of standardized work- sheets the company has developed. These worksheets capture, step by step, several of the processes the company uses to document its processes, such as quality control and equipment pre- ventive maintenance. Then we toured the 2800-sq.-m factory, starting with a look at CNC programming. Here we learned of the firm’s use of concurrent engineering to quickly move prototype work through to production. A team of four programmers feeds press brakes and turret-punch and laser cutting machines with as many as 40 new pro- grams per day.
In the plant we spied an array of Amada equipment, including an EM 255NT punching machine flanked by a seven-shelf Ama Space 748 material- storage tower and a Togu III tool grinder. Sheetmetal bending occurs via six manual press brakes, 20 to 80 ton capacity, and an Amada Astro II 100 NT HDS 1030 robotic-bending cell. Fukasawa runs the robotic-bending
A Baker’s Dozen of Fabricating-Equipment Innovation
The Amada Innovation Fair 2013 Global introduced 13 new machines for sheetmetal fabrication, some of which we saw at the EuroBlech tradeshow last fall and reported on in MetalForming magazine. Some of the machines debuting in Japan during the fair will be introduced to the North American market at FABTECH 2013 in Chicago later this year. Others will make their North American debut in 2014.
Amada officials spotlighted several of the 13 machines during our visit to the Innovation Fair. Among them:
• Lasbend AJ “blank-to-bend” integrated, automated machine combining blanking, forming, tapping and bending. It’s ideally suited to processing small parts in variable lot sizes, with blank size to 400 by 600 mm.
• FLC 3015AJ 2-kW fiber-laser cutting machine, offered as a lower-cost alternative to the company’s previously introduced 4-kW fiber-laser cutting machine.
• EM 3612 ZRT turret punch press, with four thread-tapping stations integrated in the turret, and a separate setup turret that can be equipped with tools during machine operation that then can feed the tools into the turret as required.
• EG 6013 AR robot-tended 600-kN, 1300-mm servo-electric press brake, equipped with an innovative sensor system in the backgauge. Also unique is the use of two drive motors—a low-power fast-acting motor to power rapid ram approach and retract, and a higher-power motor to power the forming operation.
• HG 1003 ATC hybrid-drive press brake, rated to 1000-kN force and with a 3110-mm beam. Its automatic tool changer features 15 punch magazines and 18 die magazines.