Page 20 - MetalForming September 2013

Walking-Beam Transfer Line
A nine-press transfer line can produce stampings fully loaded, or by using any combination less than nine presses. The options it provides this job-shop stamper are boundless.
BY BRAD F. KUVIN, EDITOR
The hallmark of any job-shop metal-stamping facility has got to be flexibility—the ability to fit production capabilities to most any job that comes down the pike. While few shops can afford to no-bid too many projects these days, at the same time capital dollars are more precious than ever. That combination of factors has job-shop stampers looking hard at fully utilizing every minute of avail- able press time.
Nothing could be truer for the 50,000- sq.-ft. plant of Great Lakes Metal Stamp- ing (GLMS), located in Cusseta, AL. GLMS, primarily a Tier Two and Three automotive and appliance OEM supplier headquartered in Bridgman, MI, opened its southern plant in 2007 to serve one customer—Benteler. It’s since developed an impressive knack of infiltrating the supply chain for the region’s automotive and appliance manufacturers.
Case in point: the plant recently took on a big project supplying 30,000 stamped parts per week to Tier One automotive supplier Mando America Corp., in nearby Opelika, AL.
One Big Transfer Press, or an Automated Press Line?
The project in question required GLMS to produce three stampings that
The nine-press transfer line at Great Lakes Metal Stamping features two walking-
beam transfer units (AP&T Monobar 80 units)—one links the first five presses in the line (far left) and a second links the last four presses in the lineup. In between (and where the press operator stands in this photo) is an AP&T Shuttle that moves stampings between the two transfer bars. Here it’s shown guarded by fencing. Watch it run.
18 MetalForming/September 2013
www.metalformingmagazine.com
Mando assembles into brake boosters for a variety of vehicle platforms. Early in 2012, GLMS president Keith Hettig assembled a team to review its options for stamping the parts. They immedi- ately dismissed progressive dies, he says, because two of the stampings required a hemming operation. So, stamping the brake-booster parts boiled down to either investing in a huge transfer press, or in a series of smaller presses linked with automation. The latter concept won out, after Hettig and the team took a close look at costing, and of course,
the goal of optimizing flexibility to posi- tion to press shop to be able to take in additional work.
“We looked at robotic transfer and traditional transfer-press technology,” says Hettig. “At the time, our decision (on linking the nine presses needed to complete the work) came down to equipment delivery time. We had a tight production schedule, with just a few months provided for testing (scheduled for August 2012); produc- tion launched in October 2012.”
The nine-press line and its automa-