3D and CAM transform fortunes at Deltron Emcon

A full 40% reduction in lead times, a 15% increase in new business in the last 12 months, 25% productivity gains and a 12% reduction in cycle times. Those are the headline improvements at electromechanical devices manufacturer Deltron Emcon - all from an investment of just £20,500 in modern CAD software. They couldn't fail to impress the panel of judges. Says Deltron Emcon R&D manager John Hutchinson: "That investment has enabled us to improve our overall capability; it's increased opportunities to improve margin; and it's greatly improved our customer service, which has led to new business and substantially increased profits. It's also enabled us to speed up new product introductions and we've attained higher product quality as well." Deltron Emcon builds equipment for a wide range of industries - serving audio equipment manufacturers and broadcast and TV and recording organisations and studios, as well as domestic appliance manufacturers, industrial drives makers, machine tool builders and gaming and vending machine makers. "Initially, we were contemplating the purchase of a multi-axis CNC machine, which would allow us to perform bespoke value added machined solutions for our die-cast box business," explains Hutchinson. "But this coincided with a website development, which allowed for automatic quotation and ordering of bespoke boxes online. That needed to remain simple but also to utilise high-tech features. There was also an opportunity to be able to further reduce costs by producing our own front-panels for our broadcast products." Other recurring issues identified at the time included slow delivery of new designs, which the management team thought was allowing competition to encroach upon Deltron Emcon's market share. Also, cost savings were not synchronised with the company's strategic purchasing deadlines, so were adding to a diminishing overall margin. That led to an engineering design-based project, aimed at addressing all of its problems in one fell swoop. The goals, according to Hutchinson were: to train the company's existing engineers to become CAD/CAM experts; to go for 'lean design' and documentation controls from inception; to implement modular design methodologies for all new products; to enable design for manufacture reviews at key development stages; and to synchronise strategic purchasing ahead of upcoming design changes. "We were looking to dramatically reduce lead-times and increase savings, to proactively take customers to market faster and to improve our capabilities as well as our productivity and quality," says Hutchinson. "We also wanted to cut out much of the supply chain and increase margin while gaining technological advantage over our competition... "We reviewed the different software options and agreed to purchase SolidWorks CAD and EdgeCam CAM software. This would allow us to take control of the whole process from design to finished product, thus saving valuable machining set-up and cycle times, as well as realise many further benefits." The result: Hutchinson reckons that the software's sheer ease of use enabled rapid learning - meaning that very soon the engineering design team was designing better products in considerably less time than before. "We could also provide a first class presentation to clients and SolidWorks meant we could quickly create an engineers' shared parts database," says Hutchinson. Beyond that, he identifies benefits as WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) benefits in terms of eliminated prototyping, while Deltron Emcon's decision to take out membership of the global design-web community, with over 300,000 users, provided useful new marketing opportunities. Right out to production "We now get foolproof designs ready for production, and our manufacturing quality has been greatly enhanced due to the high-specification instructions and artwork." And it's all very efficient: "Work instructions are easily generated and fully editable," he says. Also, although SolidWorks provides for flexible design control measures, it does force product changes to be authorised before production release - again ensuring accuracy and no risk of rework. Hutchinson is enthusiastic: "We get rapid configuration design tables, and we now have an intelligent integral enclosure design package. What's more, customers without CAD software can now evaluate our new designs and they can also import them directly into their own software if they wish." As for CAM, for Hutchinson, choosing EdgeCAM gave the company what amounts to the standard application for intelligent solids-based manufacturing. "We get realistic process simulation and fail safe collision detection from Solid Machinist CAM machine cycle simulation, which also optimises machining times and tool life. And we're now using it for machining code programming from the CAD model." Other benefits he identifies so far: machining productivity is now optimised; the system's tool-path memory constantly re-evaluates for improved cycle times; multi surface finishing options are integral with the package; and there's the remote web-enabled machine management system. "All that means we get quality finished products and high quality computer imaging so that customers can view and present end products to their clients. It's much more professional and it also eliminates lengthy photography work for marketing and PR materials," adds Hutchinson. As for the online bespoke ordering system, Deltron Emcon's new die cast box website has been enhanced with SolidWorks features, such as drill sequence animation, and quotes are now automatic online, along with simple and secure purchasing and delivery options. "We can provide fully detailed technical quotations, easily downloadable images and designs in multiple formats, and we now run a design edit and fax back service for detailed machining quotations with all technical specifications available at the touch of a button." For him, the investment means: "Deltron five, competitors nil - and that's across design, manufacturing and production." That's good, but he advises others to think about the following: "Investing in employee technical skills and providing them with the right tools to realise them; investing in state-of-the-art technology to maximise productivity levels and optimise savings; and concisely and accurately communicating designs to production operatives without ambiguity."