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Vol 28 - No 03 - April 2002 Engineering Product Configuration At a packed joint meeting with the IEE at the Engineering Lecture Theatre of the University of Huddersfield on 26 February, over 100 members heard how Hopkinsons Limited were implementing true product configuration. Hopkinsons are leading manufacturers of specialised valves of widely varying types and dimensions from 50mm to 500mm bore used in oil, power and a wide range of difficult environments. Philip Dollin, Hopkinsons Industrial Engineering Manager, explained that Hopkinsons were a long established valve manufacturer which was part of the Weir Group. Standard valves in high volumes were manufactured in the developing world where costs were lower, but Hopkinsons specialised in the low volume, one off, high specification part of the market. Although all valves they made were based upon recognised international specifications, the number of potential combinations arising from these standards meant that any particular order could be a one-off which they never manufactured again. The problem they had faced was that any new order could spend 5 weeks in the design office whilst taking only 3 weeks to make. To reduce lead times for improved customer service, they obviously had to reduce this long design time. Most companies producing many variants now use some form of computerised product configurator. However, these normally allow different standard components to be configured for an assembly. Hopkinsons' problem was that they had to design new configurations with new components against a template for each model range. After 2 years development they had now created and were implementing an in-house developed computerised engineering product configurator, which linked standard CAD and CAM software. Roger Bates, the Configured Products Project Manager, demonstrated how a customer would use the configurator by only completing a simple form stating parameters such as pipe sizes, operating pressures, temperature ranges and actuator type, for the full design and manufacturing instructions of a new valve to be computer generated! The parameters fed into a newly purchased solid modelling CAD package, ‘Solid Edge CAD' for the design to be completed. This then fed into a new CAM package ‘Edge CAM Solid Machinist' which selected tooling and wrote the machine code instructions, and generated a recommended routing and standard times and produced 2D drawings. Equally importantly the new system allowed the customer to select what quality of inspection he required and these were included in the routings. For total specials, the system could be used as what Hopkinsons described as an ‘Engineering Workbench'which generated the nearest valve within the standard parameters, but then allowed the design engineer to amend the CAD design to incorporate the non standard requirements. The system also provided full costing facilities, so that the first step was always to generate a 2D drawing and specification for quoting purposes. On the first model range which has been implemented, design times are falling from 5 weeks to less than a day! Hopkinsons believe that this will give them the leading edge over their competitors. Other advantages arising from the project are improved quality, increased standardisation of product and less scope for human error. It only remains to be seen as to whether customers can decide on placing their orders more quickly! Overall, a very impressive and professional presentation which demonstrated clearly that that manufacturing is not about being the cheapest, but about being the most responsive to customers' needs. It also showed how a traditional valve manufacturer, like Hopkinsons, could use the Internet to re-engineer their whole business. Yorkshire Branch would welcome offers of further presentations and factory visits from companies who are proud to display their innovations to their peers. Related Topics:
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