Grinding Journal - Fall 2007 - (Page 7)

“We measure our tools to ensure the quality of the product and to increase reliability in the production line, so the first part is good, there is no scrap, and there is no downtime because a tool is incorrect.” Assistant Manager Engineering, Powertrain “Before, we were relying pretty much on the people in regrind. Let’s say a reamer has to have a 10 micron runout on the lip height. Regrind setup and ran one piece. They’d check it manually with a V-block or an indicator or whatever. If it was OK they’d run the rest of them, put them in a box, and send them out to production. Now, after they’ve setup the tool, made sure it’s correct, and ground them all we bring them all into QC and every tool is measured on the Helicheck. The measurement data is automatically transferred to our database and we have an inspection report for each tool that goes into the box and out to the line. And because every tool has an ID mark engraved on the shank we can trace them all.” Checking tools a lot better than 50 scrap blocks Toyota only recently began compiling the measurement data so it’s too early to quantify the impact in detail. But Mike can already see it: “We had several size problems with a power steering pump hole in the L4 block. When we instituted this program with the Helicheck we began to measure diameter on reamers to see if they were still holding spec and we found that because of the abrasiveness of that operation in aluminum, some reamers had become undersize through repeated use. Now we catch that before the tool goes out to the line, preventing a problem. Of course we had 'first piece' checks before, but if the first tool produced a part that was within tolerance, but close, it’s understandable that they’d run production and before you’d know it you’d have 50 scrap blocks. We’ve seen those kinds of impacts.” – Mike Johnson, For Mike, QC is serious business and tool measurement is easy to justify in a plant that pumps out 2,200 engines a day: “We can fill this entire engine assembly line with bad parts in an hour. How do you put a dollar amount on that? What’s the price tag on shutting a whole engine line down?” Grinding Journal 7

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Grinding Journal - Fall 2007

Grinding Journal - Fall 2007 Contents From Virginia: Apparently no credit crunch for machine tools Why measure cutting tools Other perspectives on CNC tool measuring Productive grinding of superalloys SUPER service grinding BIG rolls Problem Solver

Grinding Journal - Fall 2007

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