MTD Audiobook

In the automotive industry the most important driving forces are sustainability, resource conservation and efficiency. These trends drive manufacturers to  find new concepts for existing production components. To meet market requirements, NILES-SIMMONS has developed the new ‘hard milling’ technology for hardened crankshafts for truck, construction machinery and agricultural engines.

This technology substitutes grinding when machining large crankshafts by implementing an efficient milling process. In turn, pre-grinding  that was previously required for machining crankshafts after hardening is removed to minimise finishing.

The process is adapted for the machining of 4, 5, 6 and 8 cylinder-crankshafts with a maximum length of up to 1350mm and a maximum flying circle of up to 310mm. It is available on both the N20CM and N30CM NILES-SIMMONS machining centres.

These special purpose machines belong to the NILES-SIMMONS crank milling (CM) Series, equipped with a distance between centres of up to 2m with a maximum diameter up to 780mm. This allows the machines to carry out highly reliable dry-milling at extremely high-production levels. Thanks to the flexible automation options, the machines run with minimal operator intervention.

For the implementation of the specific ‘hard milling’ process as a closed process, the machines are equipped with main and counter spindles with a maximum turning moment of 930Nm (100%) as well as two milling units with a maximum turning moment of 3350Nm (S1-100%) on each spindle.

The milling tools used are supplied by ‘Ingersoll Werkzeuge GmbH’ with tool diameters up to 800mm and a cutting width up to 95mm. Equipped with ceramic inserts, the milling process of the main and pin bearings run with a radial cutting depth of up to 0.5mm at hardness up to 59HRc. With cutting speeds of between 250 and 275m/min and a feed rate of between 0.23  to 0.35mm, the tool construction is possible both in monobloc and cartridge-design.

For part clamping, compensating milling jaw chucks are used on the main and counter spindles. The power-operated lever chucks with a diameter of 320mm, have a sensitive adjustment of less than 20µm on the clamping diameter. This allows a highly efficient hardening distortion compensation. 

The machines also have an integrated touch probe for exact workpiece positioning.  With that, diameter-accuracies of 25µm, roundness-accuracies of 10µm and positional accuracies of less than 0.1mm on the pin bearings are accomplished.

Programming is undertaken by specially developed crank milling software that provides completely independent programming for machining the main and pin bearings, centric elements as well as cheeks and cheek contours. The operator can easily implement necessary corrections through corresponding input fields and import form correction tables directly from the measuring machine. By doing so, programming is simplified.

The process runs entirely dry, making it more sustainable than grinding whilst cutting running costs significantly.

With the new hard milling technology, finish grinding can typically decrease by up to 75%. The investment costs for the number of machines decreases by up to 50% and integration and adaptation of the new process into existing production lines is easily possible with process-reliable cycle times of just six minutes possible. 

A fitness tracker for UK manufacturers to measure and improve productivity – from the shop floor to the top floor is being tested with Yorkshire companies by a tech start-up that has grown out of the University of Sheffield’s globally recognised Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC).

FourJaw Manufacturing Analytics (FourJaw.com) is the brainchild of AMRC Commercialisation Manager Chris Iveson and Machining Project Engineer Robin Hartley. They have developed a new Manufacturing Execution System that can unlock valuable data hidden within machine controllers and converting it to ‘deep insights’ that enable production managers to turbocharge their productivity.

“We are finding that many manufacturing companies struggle to understand what is happening on the shop floor. It is effectively a black box for them,” says Iveson, who believes FourJaw’s technology will open that box.

With financial support from the Royal Academy of Engineering, Hartley is now an Enterprise Fellow. From the University of Sheffield’s commercialisation arm, the pair are now taking their technical know-how and building a business around it. “It’s been a lot of hard work, late nights and busy weekends, but this is a massive opportunity to augment the technical excellence of UK manufacturers with the world-beating productivity that modern technology enables,” says Mr Hartley.

What they are talking about is nothing less than a digital transformation, but the FourJaw founders are cautious as the UK manufacturing sector has been bombarded with promises of digital transformation for years. Unfortunately, many of these digital solutions have been overhyped only to under-deliver. This has left manufacturers jaded and believing digital technologies offer little value in a real-world ‘shop floor’ setting.

The pair understand the difficulties of manufacturers, painting a picture of an industry where performance is difficult to measure, competitively pricing jobs is more of an art than a science, and scheduling production is a daily struggle. Even when firms put systems in place and collect data from their machines, Iveson and Hartley find they offer limited value and that firms struggle to turn ‘data’ into actionable information.

They recall recent conversations with manufacturers, where it is common to find average utilisation rates of around 50% across all the machines on the shop floor. “The problem is, that rate is across all machines and it’s really hard to trace the root cause. Is it an individual machine, a troublesome component, unexpected downtime or a production bottleneck? We created FourJaw to give manufacturers these answers and allow them to see what is actually happening on the factory floor,” Hartley says.

FourJaw can do this by getting inside the brains of the machine, the CNC. This is what actuates the motors to achieve the complex geometries needed to make a part. For all but a few firms, the raw data stored inside these brains is so difficult to translate into knowledge, it is simply discarded as a form of digital swarf.

This prompted Hartley to set up a research project to decipher the stored data and turn it into information that could give manufacturers the competitive edge over lower-cost economies. Having achieved this goal, however, Hartley and Iveson were still short of a smart system that manufacturers could simply plugin and play. A system that not only extracts data from the control units, but turns it automatically into insights.

To achieve this, the two entrepreneurs turned to Sheffield-based software engineers, Razor, to perfect a technology that interfaces with, and extracts data from, complex and varied machine tools, before securely sending the data to the cloud for detailed analysis.

“This required some serious thought, a lot of creative thinking and software engineering skill,” says Jamie Hinton, CEO of Razor. “The entire process was agile – properly agile. Our understanding and direction changed regularly, as we were in totally uncharted waters with the problems being faced.”

Focusing in on a subset of the most popular control units, adapters were created that could be remotely installed in the factory and talk to the CNC controllers in their native language/protocols. These adapters extract data, push it securely to the cloud and then process it in a variety of ways, creating insights that are bespoke to the needs of stakeholders at several levels of the manufacturing business.

During development, iterations of the adapters were installed at the AMRC’s Factory of the Future with live data streaming being processed in real-time. The AMRC’s Deputy Head of Digital, Jon Bray, says: “This is a beautiful example of what can happen when digital meets manufacturing. You can only get this kind of breakthrough when you bring really, really good software guys into close collaboration with really detailed engineering knowledge to interpret what the software is telling you.”

FourJaw is business of entrepreneurs that wanted to simplify the process further for ease of adoption and usability. They have now teamed up with Sheffield based software development and technology company, The Curve, whose on-demand technical expertise and ‘big data’ know-how is being used to develop an app to present data analytics in a readily digestible format for production managers.

“It’s been great working with another recent start-up, but one with an incredible pedigree,” says Iveson of the firm set up by Paul Ridgway former CTO and co-founder of telematics firm The Floow. Paul Ridgway who is also a software engineering graduate of the University of Sheffield said: “Productivity in the current market is key to the viability of any business, helping free-up resource, lower costs and ultimately beat competitors.”

“The analytical solutions FourJaw are providing are incredibly important and it has been fantastic to help make this accessible to the market.”

The FourJaw business model is ‘software-as-a-service’. A sort of ‘Netflix or Spotify’ for manufacturing execution systems. Instead of paying a huge up-front cost, which is a significant barrier to adoption, particularly for SME’s, and a blocker to FourJaws’ growth, manufacturers pay a much more affordable rental each month for use of the system.

“That means the manufacturer gets continuous updates to the software, seamlessly rolled out from the cloud just as Netflix does for its subscribers,” says Iveson, who sees their affordable product being an invaluable tool for thousands of SME’s. “At the moment, there is a small amount of on-site installation required. The vision is that in the future, the installation will be as simple as sending a purpose-built computer to the customer with all the software fully loaded, which they plug into their shop-floor network enabling us to access the machine data and feed it back as knowledge.”

Bringing old machines into the digital age

But what if the manufacturer has old machines with no connectivity, which is not uncommon? Here, too, FourJaw has come up with a solution. By retrofitting a sensor system directly to the CNC machine, Iveson and Hartley can bring even an ancient Bridgeport into the digital age.

While this low-fidelity option does not tap into the rich data source of the CNC controller, with a bit of clever analysis, there is still a lot to be gained using sensor signals. The insights are valuable for driving productivity improvements and providing much-needed visibility for older machines. Despite the different data collection methods, all insights generated by FourJaw are presented in a single unified view of the shop floor, allowing manufacturers to ignore the software technicalities and get on with what they do best, making parts!

Ironically, establishing a start-up in the midst of a global pandemic is less a threat than an opportunity for FourJaw. “We are finding it easier to get to talk to the right people than before, and not having to travel to set up a meeting is a big bonus,” says Iveson. Add to this the fact that the team are working to develop the technology to be installed remotely, and Iveson feels that this could be an ideal opportunity for global medium-sized firms to harness the power of industrial digitalisation.

Iveson continues: “Look around the Sheffield City Region and you will see global leaders in manufacturing whose strength lies in their power to continually innovate.” Think AESSEAL in Rotherham, where Iveson spent his early career or Gripple in Sheffield. Increasingly, we are seeing the emergence of a new breed of software engineer keen to exploit the boundless opportunities that come from working with the grain of the region’s historic manufacturing base.

Jamie Hinton and Paul Ridgway are in the vanguard of the ‘digital meets manufacturing renaissance’, and are seeing the benefits not just for their own businesses but for the wider prosperity of the region. As Hinton says: “You don’t get much better than helping a brand-new business being formed and the first customer created. FourJaw is now in production and receiving some incredible feedback. We are astonishingly proud of being a part of its journey and being instrumental in bringing it to market.” 

Trucks, vans, buses, taxis, electric vans, fire engines, ambulances, waste disposal trucks – Britain’s commercial vehicle sector is very diverse. While challenged by the Covid-19 crisis there are bright spots, as home deliveries increase and commercial transport reduces carbon emissions. Will Stirling reports.

The UK’s commercial vehicle (CV) sector comprises a nice mix of the old and the new, from Leyland Trucks whose parent company made its first truck in 1896 to start-up Arrival that is already tipped to be a world leader in manufacturing electric vans and buses.

Depressed by the COVID-19 crisis, CVs are still essential to business, so the sector has weathered the storm far better than mainstream automotive and some companies are doing well. Industry body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) showed in August that the light CV market (i.e. vans up to 3.5 tonnes), grew in July for the first time since January. This was up 7.1% on the same month in 2019, attributing the return to work for sectors like construction where vans are needed.

Two megatrends are helping the CV and light commercial vehicle (LCV) sector: the growth of home delivery and net-zero carbon targets. A sector hit hard is bus manufacture, as the pandemic dried up demand for public transport, this is only now slowly returning. In this automotive report, we offer a round-up of the commercial vehicle industry with an optimistic view from an automotive expert, Professor David Bailey.

Vauxhall Vivaro

Vauxhall, part of the PSG Group, manufactures left and right-hand drive Vivaro vans for its Opel, Peugeot and Citroen brands from its Luton factory. Luton went down to one shift during lockdown but returned to two shifts and then three shifts in July as demand for the popular van grew, pulling 200 employees from the quieter Ellesmere Port factory which manufactures the Opel Astra. Luton produced 55,000 vans in 2019 down from 62,000 in 2018, as the plant completely retooled in 2019 for the manufacture of the latest Vivaro model. Headcount is now up to 1750 and production is at full capacity.

Some big orders have been placed for Vauxhall’s new fully electric Vivaro-e vans. Openreach, the BT division, has placed an order of 270 Vivaro-e vans and 9 Corsa-e-cars and in July the car company signed a deal with British Gas to supply 1,000 e-vans, the biggest commercial EV fleet in Britain to date.

Leyland Trucks

US truck builder PACCAR owns DAF, the owner of the Leyland Truck brand, which manufactures circa 19,000 medium and heavy-duty trucks per year from its Preston factory. All European DAF plants in Belgium, The Netherlands and the UK implemented big Covid-response factory measures from March to April and recommenced operations on 27 April.

“For the moment we are less concerned about production figures,” said Harry Wolters. “Instead, the safety of DAF and Leyland Trucks employees is our number one priority and it is why the production volume is still relatively low. We will only crank it up when it is safe to do so.

London Electric Vehicle Company

Originally called The London Taxi Company under then parent Manganese Bronze, until ownership by Chinese automotive group Geely changed it to LEVC, this Coventry firm has always exclusively manufactured the iconic London ‘Hackney cab’ taxis. Responding to the call for Net Zero by 2040 or 2050 depending on the specific industry targets, LEVC chose a fully electric motor variant only and will now manufacture an electric van, the VN5, with up to 5.5m3 capacity and a gross payload of 830kg built on a modified chassis of the classic taxi.

VN5 has a ‘zero emissions capable’ range of over 300 miles delivered by LEVC’s eCity electric technology, and its capacity easily accommodates two Euro sized pallets. As more short-range and last-mile logistics firms move to zero emissions, prospects for the VN5 are bright.

Alexander Dennis (ADL)

The bus manufacturer, part of the NFI Group that owns US bus brands and UK coachbuilder Plaxton, has factories in Guildford, Falkirk and Scarborough and until the pandemic, was riding high with group revenues breaking £500m. Sadly, the virus put the brakes on new sales as thousands of people shunned public transport and orders for buses in the UK and abroad dried up, and the firm announced 650 job losses in July.

This could be avoided or reduced if the cash-strapped government fulfils its earlier pledge to buy 4,000 electric buses, a large slice of which would go to ADL. This decision is currently delayed. So, for now, the redundancies are set to go ahead and this great British company is facing a troubled future.

Wright Bus

Ryse Hydrogen, a hydrogen production and refuelling business owned by Jo Bamford, son of JCB owner Lord Anthony Bamford, rescued troubled Northern Irish bus manufacturer Wrightbus in 2018. Wrightbus had pioneered hydrogen-powered buses and pre-Covid had a small number operating in London when it fell into difficulties. Bamford saw the neat fit with Ryse Hydrogen and pounced, saving hundreds of jobs at Wrightbus. It now needs orders and Ryse and Wrightbus have presented a business plan to the government to subsidise the manufacture of 3,000 new hydrogen buses while outlining how the UK could become a ‘global leader in hydrogen technologies’, that would they claim could create 1,000 new jobs at Wrightbus and 150 at Ryse Hydrogen.

Arrival

Arrival describes itself as one of the UK’s largest unicorns – businesses with a future value over US$1bn within an unspecified timescale. A quick look at its new electric Arrival Bus gives credence to such hype, and its business plan goes way beyond manufacturing. As well as the bus and the Arrival Generation 2 electric vans that secured a whopping 10,000 unit order from delivery group UPS in January, the new company wants to create an ‘Integrated Public Transportation Ecosystem’ that includes buses, car sharing, taxis, delivery robots, charging infrastructure, micro-factories for production and digital services, where it wants to help cities meet net-zero emissions targets.

Angloco

Late in 2019, the UK’s oldest manufacturer of fire vehicles secured a big deal to replace and service most of the UK Ministry of Defence’s fire fleet. The £30m order comes via the Defence Fire and Rescue Project – a large outsourcing sales and support contract recently awarded to Capita plc.

Under the contract, Angloco will supply more than 80 modern fire fighting vehicles and support them in the UK and globally for the next 12 years. Before the MoD deal, Angloco reported strong growth in 2019 and a second factory opening, a 12,000sq/ft unit opposite its 30,000sq/ft headquarters in Batley, West Yorkshire – that will be capable of manufacturing 100 fire engines a year.   

Close Brothers Asset Finance believes it is privileged to work with some of the most cutting-edge companies the UK has to offer, including the innovative supercar maker, Briggs Automotive Company (BAC).  BAC produce the single-seated BAC Mono, which in 2018 won the Supercar Shoot Out at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, setting the fastest supercar time ever clocked. Here we explain how, and why, BAC selected Close Brothers Asset Finance as their long-term finance partner… The customer

Founded in 2009, Briggs Automotive Company (BAC) is known for developing the world’s first, and only – single-seater, road-legal supercar. The car is the product of brothers Ian and Neill Briggs’ ambition to produce a car that delivers the ultimate driving experience – a vehicle that focuses solely on the person behind the wheel and is the ultimate piece of driving sporting equipment.

BAC Mono was showcased on BBC’s Top Gear – setting the fastest-ever Power Lap time on road-legal tyres – and went on to be named the Stig’s Car of the Year in 2011. Televised accolades were only the start of things to come for BAC, with the Mono scooping seven production car lap records at iconic circuits around the world. 

The challenge

BAC continually invests and collaborates to create new and improved components, materials and technology to remain at the cutting edge of automotive manufacturing.  The business needed a solution that would simultaneously allow continuity of daily operations while executing expansion plans.

To produce and release future models, BAC secured a property adjacent to its existing building to increase servicing capacity and manufacturing space. However, a new fit-out was required to ensure the new building was fit for purpose and allow the supercar manufacturer to develop and manufacture its ultra-high-performance vehicles.

The solution

Neill Briggs, BAC’s Co-Founder and Director of Product Development approached Close Brothers Asset Finance because of the companies’ shared values and understanding of the importance of long-term working partnerships.

Matthew Sproston, Area Sales Manager at Close Brothers Asset Finance, reviewed BAC’s business requirements to better understand the finance options that would best suit BAC.

BAC had several vehicles they retained for development, track days and demonstrations. One of the vehicles held significant sentimental value because it was the first BAC Mono ever produced, and because of this, its intrinsic value was far more than the sum of its parts.

Matthew worked closely with BAC, using this unique asset to raise the required capital for the new building fit-out, developing a tailor-made Sale and HP Back agreement, which allowed BAC to still have full use of the treasured BAC Mono.

The outcome

By releasing funds against an existing asset, BAC completed the fit out of the new building without affecting cash flow.  BAC can now continue to do what it does best: develop and manufacture ultra-high-performance vehicles.

“We are incredibly proud of what we have achieved in a relatively short time,” said Neill Briggs, Co-Founder and Director of Product Development. “BAC understands the value of relationships, which is why we chose Close Brothers Asset Finance as a key funding partner. They share our commitment to long-term partnerships and I’m really pleased to have them along for the journey.”

To find out how Close Brothers Asset Finance can support your business with asset finance call: 01244 457 569 or visit our website www.closeasset.co.uk/manufacturing

Close Brothers Asset Finance believes it is privileged to work with some of the most cutting-edge companies the UK has to offer, including the innovative supercar maker, Briggs Automotive Company (BAC).  BAC produce the single-seated BAC Mono, which in 2018 won the Supercar Shoot Out at the Goodwoo...

Trucks, vans, buses, taxis, electric vans, fire engines, ambulances, waste disposal trucks – Britain’s commercial vehicle sector is very diverse. While challenged by the Covid-19 crisis there are bright spots, as home deliveries increase and commercial transport reduces carbon emissions. Will St...

A fitness tracker for UK manufacturers to measure and improve productivity – from the shop floor to the top floor is being tested with Yorkshire companies by a tech start-up that has grown out of the University of Sheffield’s globally recognised Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC).

F...

In the automotive industry the most important driving forces are sustainability, resource conservation and efficiency. These trends drive manufacturers to  find new concepts for existing production components. To meet market requirements, NILES-SIMMONS has developed the new ‘hard milling’ techn...

As an independent research and technology organisation, TWI Ltd has recently invented a highly disruptive, new sub-surface machining technique called CoreFlow™. As soon as MTD magazine heard the term ‘Sub-Surface Machining’, we were intrigued, so here Senior Project Leader, Vito Di Pietro take...

Founded in 1946 to undertake subcontract electric motor repairs, Stoke based Fletcher Moorland recently bought its first vertical machining centre, a FANUC ROBODRILL. MTD visited the company to find out more.

Commenting upon the back story, Matthew Fletcher says: “Fletcher Moorland was a company ...