Optimizing CAD/CAM

Manufacturing Engineering, Jul 1996

Modern Engineering (Troy, MI), a $270-million supplier of engineering and staffing services to the Big Three, as well as many foreign automakers, regards its computeraided manufacturing systems as more than vehicles for meeting customer requirements. "CAD/CAM is the master-there is no longer any question," says Ravi Kapur, Modern's manager of CAD/CAM/CAE. "The question is how you can use it to optimize your engineering processes to reduce cost and time to market while improving quality."

Customers provide CAD data to Modem describing their manufacturing needs and expect to receive prototype parts and assemblies, as well as CAD data, at a project's completion. Moreover, many customers have specific requirements about what CAD environment the data must be in. In order to satisfy these requirements, Modem has most major systems installed. However, Kapur's group relies on Strim from Matra Datavision (Andover, MA) for most prototype CAD support work. "Other systems are customer requirements," says Kapur. "Strim is not required. We prefer it."

He transfers nearly all design data from customers into Strim and generates trimmed surfaces and cutterpaths for prototype tooling. Innovative algorithms and an intuitive interface are the twin pillars supporting Strim's surface modeling capabilities. Kapur notes that nothing he has worked with can match the speed of Strim when it comes to cutting metal. Modern's suite of Taurus vertical duplicators and Comet lathes and grinders are all driven by 486 controllers running toolpaths created using Strim.

Modern is currently evaluating a number of technologies enabled by Strim, in particular, a simulation of metal pressing operations. The program has a meshing subsystem for finite-element analysis combined with a third-party solver. This will result in faster auto-meshing from surface data suited to forming simulation.

Kapur's group is also experimenting with Strim's surface reconstruction module for use with the company's Hymarc laser scan system. A physical model scanned by the laser converts into a point cloud that generates toolpaths. The process is expected to be most beneficial for die addenda and binder applications. For more information, Circle 228.