Most Read
Most E-mailed
E-mail Article
Print Article![[Get Copyright Permissions]](http://license.icopyright.net/images/icopy-w.gif){kind=small}
Remmele Engineering Inc. (Brighton, MN) made its reputation in providing the highest quality of complex machined components to various market segments. Whether it's unique parts that manufacturers cannot or will not produce themselves, or tackling a material that is deemed too difficult to machine, Remmele has proven themselves time and again as a viable and creative solution developer.
The company has four different manufacturing plants throughout the metropolitan area of Minneapolis. With over 130 CNC machining centers of various sizes and functions, the customer base that they serve can range from very small, intricate medical applications to larger, complex aerospace parts.
The firm's engineering reputation created opportunities that were knocking at their door, literally every day. However, serving various markets also meant that the manufacturing support had to be arranged and segmented appropriately. In other words, different areas needed different types of tooling . . . a lot of different types of tooling. In fact, tooling demands were becoming unmanageable.
"We had no formal tool management system, so orders were being placed for components already on-hand, everything was always hot and expediting cutter deliveries via UPS Red was a daily occurrence," explains Tom Shuga, CIM manager. "NC programmers and manufacturing engineers had to physically browse the crib inventory, looking for tooling which would meet their needs. Often, it was easier and faster just to order more. We knew we had to find and implement a system solution that could get this under control."
The search began and TDM Systems, Inc. (Schaumburg, IL) was approached. The problem was evaluated as to how best to provide a solution. Once this was completed, the process of dedicated work by Remmele staff began to tackle the problem head on and realize how to best implement a Tool Data Management (TDM) system to help alleviate the situation.
The installation of this system included the tool crib module to achieve inventory control, but also the ability to build tool assembly libraries and tool lists. The TDM system also interfaced to their NX CAM and Vericut Systems.
DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH
A side benefit was that, once all of the tool crib components were loaded into the tool management system, the company actually ‘recovered' tooling inventory that was valued at seven-figures (!) and turned a huge "invisible inventory" into visible assets for the CAM programming and engineering groups to draw upon.