Metalworking is a great industry that makes a major contribution to the U.S. economy, but it doesn’t typically attract movie idols or sports stars. That changed when NASCAR champion Brad Keselowski joined the ranks of metalworking entrepreneurs.
As a provider of automation equipment and software, our company is immersed in this ongoing, revolutionary, data-driven ride, and we’re anticipating a new trend: our customers are not just automating their traditional subtractive methods.
The U.S. auto industry has been automated for decades. Production of cars and trucks is associated with large, hulking robots fenced off from human employees. Inside those fenced off areas, tasks such as welding are performed. The industry, though, is advancing on the automation front.
Connected manufacturing and digitization technologies are spurring many of the major innovations in CNC machine controls that help machine shops cut metal and create parts as quickly and efficiently as possible.
The Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute (DMDII) will be renamed MxD and will stand as an independent organization from UI LABS, now that it has achieved strong momentum and robust fiscal health, the organization said today.
The human factor is sometimes just too cumbersome in manufacturing. Take the German chipmaker Infineon: By using an autonomous robot called Scout from MetraLabs for the last several years, the automotive supplier shrank to 10 from 300 the number of minutes it takes to collect the clean-room data needed to measure the presence of rare gases in the air.
The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is set to award $10 million in funding this year to the Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute (DMDII) here, UI Labs CEO Caralynn Nowinski Collens, said this morning. UI Labs is DMDII’s parent organization.
So you have finally decided to start your digital transformation. You have seen the benefits around digitizing your operations. By connecting your disparate systems, you can start seeing what is actually happening in your plant and become more efficient. And not just in one plant, but in multiple plants.
Optical measuring systems, which use light instead of touch, are becoming more widely used in manufacturing because of their faster speed, higher accuracy and ability to measure oddly shaped parts.
The requirements for FDA 21 CFR Part 11 are in place for a good reason: When companies are making a part that goes inside your body, the engineering and manufacturing process must be meticulously documented, tested and controlled. People’s lives are at stake.