BMP slashes component manufacture time from months to 30 minutes

BMP’s plant in Accrington, Lancashire makes ultra-high grade polyurethane blades that wipe excess toner from printing machine and photocopier print transfer drums. Since the product demands a variety of specifications of accurately cut, clear sheets mounted onto metal blades, it was very labour intensive -- and hence the company opened production facilities in China to make it competitive. But now, using a largely secret process, BMP has developed a flexible, automated production line in the UK that obviates the need for six-week Chinese shipping, and enables the company to produce a component from its principal product line in just 30 minutes. “We had a rough idea of what we wanted to achieve – the ability to cast directly onto metal blades, thus avoiding the need for cutting and the extra adhesion processes,” says Patrick Pepperday, BMP’s engineering manager. “A highlight was the realisation that high frequency, infra red was the perfect heating method once properly calibrated, but at the same time, we began to recognise that it might prove impossible to co-ordinate the sequencing of the nine different processes on the production line.” One month into developing the groundbreaking process and with serious challenges to the idea, Pepperday commissioned Northern Technologies to create a virtual model of a manufacturing line using Delmia Quest software. Paul Bateson, manufacturing specialist at Northern Technologies, says: “During the two weeks that it took me to develop a comprehensive Quest model, I managed to spot even more potential snags with the line, but almost all of these were solved by variable speed drives, enabling the conveyors to run at variable speeds. “This prevented the logjam effect that can occur when some processes take under a minute, while others take nine minutes. The Quest model also proved that instead of the originally planned six workers needed to run the line, just three were needed, and this was despite deciding not to build in automated blade fitting. Delmia Human allowed us to analyse the cycle times of the workers without trial and error try out sessions.” Says Pepperday: “Quest addressed all our trouble spots – with the result that we have a production capability able to fulfil all our initial expectations and considerably more. We envisage that our automated line will be able to produce 3.6 million blades per annum at the same time as flexibly manufacturing our new range of feed tyres. “We had not even considered diversifying into this product until we realised the possibilities our new line presented us with. We expect to produce in excess of a million of these in our first year without working at full capacity. Next year, the line could be flexibly expanded or even duplicated, as it has, since its inception, managed to decrease the work content of blade and feed tyre production by around 80%.”