With thousands of fastener locations that need to be drilled and filled to complete a plane, drilling and fastening remain the largest areas of opportunity for automated robotics applications in aerospace. New developments are also making robots more attractive than ever in the aerospace and defense space—especially improved rigidity and accuracy in the robots themselves.
Automation development in the aerospace industry has quickened its pace, with the aviation and defense industries attempting to further automate manufacturing processes to meet growing OEM order backlogs and critical aerospace-defense program deadlines.
Manufacturers face a difficult task juggling the current “innovation agenda.” Today, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), robotic automation and artificial intelligence (AI) are all poised to be the next big thing.
Conrad Leiva, vice president for product strategy and alliance at iBASEt and chair of the smart manufacturing working group at MESA International, speaks with Smart Manufacturing magazine Editor in Chief Brett Brune.
Adam Hansel, chief systems and sales officer, DMG Mori (Hoffman Estates, IL) sums it up perfectly: “Go into any shop. Ask them if they want to automate. The answer is yes. 100%.”
Mazak Corp. (Florence, KY) continues its steady advance toward the complete factory digitization of all its manufacturing operations with the recent transformation of its Oguchi, Japan, facility into yet another Mazak iSMART Factory.
Unplanned downtime and production loss due to equipment failure is one of the leading losses for manufacturers. Most shops perform maintenance on a fixed schedule or on failure. This means a machine will be maintained regardless of how often it is used and unexpected breakdowns will stop production.
Simulation tools are making it much easier for manufacturers to optimize their processes, visualizing the entire path of production from NC metalcutting simulations through 3D design and factory-floor imaging.
Data management and the maintenance of clean, usable data for asset performance metrics pose great challenges for manufacturers today.
The nexus of cyber and physical security threats is the stuff of nightmares, and while manufacturers are waking up to it as a reality, experts worry that the awakening is happening too slowly.
