Effective program management in production of heavy-load cars

To strengthen and expand the positions in the market, the Belarusian producer of the BelAZ softwares heavy-load cars made big investments a vproizvodstvo, and, first of all, carried out extensive upgrade of section on production of parts of a running gear. The unified technology of numerical control, and for performance improvement and accuracy cares for more than 150 new machines and also for transparency and efficiency of production process all machines are integrated in network by the MCIS system (Motion Control Information System) of Siemens AG company.

The unified technology of management

150 new machines of leading manufacturers from Belarus, the Czech Republic, Western Europe, the USA and Japan, such as Tos Vansdorf, Tos Hulin, Tos Kuvim, Mas Kovosvit, Tos Celacovice from the Czech Republic, the Gomel plant of Kirov, MZAL Minsk, the plants of VISTAN and VIZAS from Vitebsk from Belarus, Gleason, Liebherr, Reishauer, Taisei, Giana, Deckel Maho, Mikromat, Junker, etc. became a basis of competitive processing using the CNC. The share of the Czech machines makes about 60%. Relying on the more than ten years' experience of communication with the CNC equipment, the BelAZ developed is made specific objectives for future solution which and in the smallest parts were carried out by all suppliers of machines.

The general machine park consisting from: the horizontal and vertical processing centers; horizontal and vertical lathes; the turning and carousel and turning milling machines of zuboobrabatyvayushchy machines and circular grinding machines, had to become the unified technology of numerical control and drives.

The purposes of these measures are obvious: training costs of highly skilled service staff of the new equipment and also the maintenance of a warehouse of spare parts decreases, thus, to a minimum. On behalf of Siemens BelAZ found the complex supplier who along with the CNC systems, modular, applicable for various types of machines, and drives provides with also optimum suitable equipment for the organization of a shop data network. Such projects are already widely used around the world. The Siemens company is also capable to perform reliable service and support in the Republic of Belarus.

The Sinumerik 840D CNC system together with digital Simodrive 611 drives the manufacturer specified the duet of the new standard which already proved the accuracy and power in different conditions. About 60 people from personnel of the BelAZ who work on these machines and are engineers, technologists, operators and service personnel intensively studied in Siemens company in Germany, in SITEK in Minsk and at machine tool builders. Thanks to emphasis put on on one model of a management system these training passed most effectively and profitable.

More than the partner of the leader of the world market in Belarus the group of SITEK company (SITEK Group) in Minsk which in recent years among other things develops numerous projects on upgrade of machines using necessary Know-How is. The SITEK group is an authorized partner in sale and service of Siemens concern. The service center "SITEK" offers the individual engineering services concerning technology of automation or electric equipment of Siemens for machines. SITEK in close cooperation with all above-named machine tool builders, the BelAZ and Siemens successfully implemented all stages of the project. Since then SITEK undertook a part of a warehouse of spare parts and is service provider Siemens AG in the territory of Republic of Belarus and the CIS countries.

Central office programs and providing programs

Optimum to use the modern machine park and also to seize variety of programs for processing of parts, the scheme of an information flow between a stage of preparation of production and production was developed and implemented. As basis serve the approved, scalable modules of the software of MCIS (Motion Control Information System) which Siemens specially developed for effective management of NC programs.

All machines equipped with the SINUMERIK CNC systems and devices on installation of the tool are located in one workshop and are united in a uniform standard Ethernet network on which they are connected with the central DNC server and places of programming at the factory level (MES, Manufacturing Execution System) (Production management systems).

The server of a databank is capable to manage 100.000 NC programs. From security reasons all data, including the operating system, it is automatically copied on the mirror hard drive. Besides, there is an uninterruptible power supply unit and also previously configured standby server which in case of need almost imperceptibly can assume work. The second control station allows to expand access to MES level, each subsequent station can be in case of need in any place of an intergirovan in network. At a preparation stage the written programs can together with up-to-date data on installation of the tool directly be requested by a management system, be optimized on site, be fulfilled and in the last status to come back in the central archive. The module of the software of MCIS works directly at a management system of SINUMERIK therefore there is no need for installation of the additional hardware.

Covers of the user are executed in Russian. As additional support detailed instructions, for example, on a clip of procurement or the sequence of processing in a graphic form can be caused that reduces error probability in service even more. The convenient management system for programs and providing programs (DNC) Siemens saves from use of diskettes or even a punched tape and does data structure in general more economic. Fast and exact data transfer reduces setup time and raises effective machine time.

Continuous process of improvement thanks to a collecting device of machine data (MDE)

Premises for continuous improvement of process in conditions of production using the CNC is everyday practice of collecting and the analysis of machine data (MDE). For this purpose in the second stage of the project the necessary basis was put. Thanks to all machines with the modules of the software installed directly on a management system to Sinumerik 840D no additional devices, such as terminals, typewritten devices or the connecting equipment were required. It is very economic.

Motion Control Information System automatically collects such information as operating time of the machine, an error, the message, effective machine time and a downtime. Plain masks on a panel of the operator of the Sinumerik system allow to perform among other things manual entry of data for the idle time of the machine caused by organizational timepoints.

The parameters collected thus can be individually prepared, graphically visualized and processed as directly on a management system, and on the central computer of the top level. Thanks to such transparency of all processes on the machine an opportunity in case of violations very quickly appears to take measures and to reduce a downtime of the machine.

Using automatic data acquisition determination of working capacity and capacity of the machine is much more simply, and, above all more objectively. The operator has an opportunity to determine operation modes of machines and separate units by their criteria and to obtain reliable information. Thus it is possible to learn quickly organizational problems (for example, "There is no material") or technical (for example, "The tool is broken"). Problems can be quickly fixed.

As integrator of the MCIS system on JSC Mogilev Automobile Plant the Department of implementation of MES and APS systems of SITEK LLC group (SITEK Group) acted.