IIOT
FEATURE
A BETTER WORKING CULTURE
How Industry 4.0 can improve manufacturers’ shop floor working culture, and the bottom line. analysis for all the machines, quickly and securely, and in a way that would benefit the organization’s cultural shift towards Industry 4.0. Adding to the challenge was the fact that the machines came from different manufacturers – DMG, Mazak, Correa and Parpas – and were both new and old. Furthermore, each machine was costly to run, so the control solution OSI decided on would need to have a real impact on financial gains. “Before choosing Sandvik Coromant, we took a few months to properly research all the tools available, and to select the right partner for this project,” explained Hubert Breton, operational efficiency and digital technology manager at OSI Precision. “In fact, we had up to 15 criteria,” he added. “They included
Quebec-based OSI Precision employed Sandvik Coromant’s IIoT software to connect, monitor and assess the performance of several CNC machines from different vendors.
that the control and monitoring system had to be versatile, configurable, and easily adapt to all our different types of machine. We also needed it to integrate with our other digital systems — databases and so on — and also required an easy-to-use interface for our operators.” In the end, OSI opted for Sandvik Coromant’s CoroPlus Machining Insights platform, a modern cloud-based machine monitoring solution. The main reason was for its trusted partnership and support. “Having data is really the first step in deriving the best performance and profitability from these machines, and to be able to measure this ourselves,” said Bijal Patel, a senior digital machining specialist at Sandvik Coromant. “That is where Sandvik Coromant comes in.”
Pilot project
Sandvik’s machine monitoring platform allows OSI to see not only the current state of machines, but also how they have performed since the day they were connected. 18 DESIGN ENGINEERING March/April 2022
OSI Precision was also won over by Sandvik Coromant’s plans to develop the CoroPlus MachiningInsights platform further into the future. Not only does the
Photos: Sandvik Coromant
Big data and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) grant employees easier, and more centralized, control and access to data. But do these technologies improve the working culture on the shop floor? That question was put to the test by OSI Precision when it installed software by Sandvik Coromant to help with its Industry 4.0 roll-out. Based in Quebec, OSI Precision is a general engineering manufacturer of complex parts that uses several CNC machining lathes, and a milling machine, on its shop floor. However, the company wanted to better connect its nine CNC machines. For assistance, OSI turned to Sandvik Coromant to help consolidate the control and performance
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