Cadalyst - July 2008 - (Page 39)

plmstrategies Figure 2. The sheer size of T3’s products, such as the 65,000-lb Blow-Out Preventer shown here, gives the company a reason to do everything it can to prevent cutting the wrong parts. WAN connection is to the success of the setup. “When we started this project, we had mediocre WAN connection,” recalled Wolfe. “The connections were less than stellar.” When T3 engineers from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, or Houma, Louisiana, remotely accessed the files and programs housed in the central repository in Houston, Texas, they experienced launch times as long as 30 minutes — regardless of the size of the assembly file. “We have since upgraded our connections companywide,” explained Wolfe. “T1 is the minimum pipeline for all our main facilities. We have 20-Mbps lines in some of the heavily staffed offices.” For security, T3 uses a multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) network setup to connect to its remote servers. Browser-Based BOM When engineers want to consult the bill of materials (BOM) on T3’s shop floor, they don’t need to launch SmarTeam. Instead, they fire up Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox. “Because we display the BOM on a Web interface, we don’t have to distribute software,” Scott said. “So they don’t have to know the ins and outs of the PDM system. They’re merely data consumers. They get in, get what they need in the format they want, and go about the rest of their day.” T3 uses the same method in all of its joint ventures with overseas partners in China, Dubai, and Mexico. “SmarTeam’s project-based security lets us set it up so they can access one set of data but not the rest,” explained Scott. printing, prevent the file from launching if it’s been moved to a different location, or set a time limit.” “Adobe’s DRM technology is nifty,” said Scott. “But when you tie it to the product data in SmarTeam, you can set up rules for the level of control you give people. So you can tell the system that, when someone does X and Y to the file, you want Z-level restriction applied to it.” Such a setup, Wolfe and Scott imagined, would not only prevent IP compromise but also eliminate communication errors. Smart Resource Management Energy Equipment, (now known as T3 Creekmont), a company T3 recently acquired, had in its portfolio a line of gate valves that are comparable to the ones marketed by T3. Now that the two companies have merged, Wolfe has the unenviable task of going through Creekmont’s database to figure out which ones should be preserved and which ones shouldn’t. “SmarTeam helps us do that by keeping the data clean,” Wolfe said. “By sorting existing data with our unique profile-card attributes, we can easily search for specific designs already in the system and compare them with the designs we need to load and review for duplication.” Because T3’s companywide CAD platform is SolidWorks, Wolfe and his staff will soon need to make a decision about the Pro/ENGINEER files inherited from Creekmont. A data conversion is certainly under consideration, but it’s not necessarily the only option, in Wolfe’s assessment. “Creekmont’s business is good. We don’t want to introduce any hurdles in the way they’ve been designing their products,” he said. “We might just keep them in Pro/E.” Added Scott, “SmarTeam allows T3 to either convert the Pro/E files to SolidWorks and maintain the history [of the conversion] or keep a mixed environment [housing AutoCAD, SolidWorks, and Pro/E].” In fact, Wolfe doesn’t foresee any problem maintaining and working with hybrid assemblies that contain both SolidWorks and Pro/E data. He believes he can rely on SmarTeam’s relationship management features to track the different parts in an assembly. Error-Proof CNC T3’s products generally weigh between 20,000 and 65,000 lb (figure 2). At this scale, making a mistake means producing a pile of scrap metal comparable in size to a PT Cruiser — or bigger. As a result, error-proofing the production process is a priority for T3’s CIO Adam Barrilleaux, whose favorite axiom is “whatever it takes.” Barrilleaux believes it will take a computer numericalcontrol (CNC) production process driven by the consolidated product data that lives on a network. In response, Wolfe and Scott are working on a system that distills the CNC operators’ workflow down to a number of options in a dropdown menu. Theoretically, the business rules in place in SmarTeam will determine the CNC programming options available to the operators. “Let’s say you’re getting ready to cut a part,” Scott explained. “You scan the barcode on the raw metal piece, you scan the machine, and the machine communicates with SmarTeam and the ERP system and comes back to you with a list of [toolpath] programming options, limited to only the subset of operations applicable to that part and that machine. The invalid options are excluded from the choices.” Wolfe and Scott won’t know if this process will run as smoothly as they imagine until six or seven months from now, but the premise seems like irrefutable logic. If you don’t want to have to scrap parts, don’t give the CNC operators the option to cut the parts incorrectly. Kenneth Wong is Cadalyst’s executive editor. E-mail him at Kenneth. Wong at cadalyst.com. 39 Crossing the WAN Chasm Since starting the ENOVIA SmarTeam implementation, T3 and its consultant Razorleaf have discovered how crucial July 2008 cadalyst www.cadalyst.com http://www.cadalyst.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Cadalyst - July 2008

Cadalyst - July 2008 Editor’s Window CAD Central FIRST Robotic Beasts Draw Students to Engineering Power! Speed! Action! — Mighty Mobile Workstations are Packed and Ready for Adventure! Vico Virtual Construction Suite 2008 AMD ATI FireGL V8600 and FireGL V8650 — 1-GB and 2-GB Graphics Cards Gaining Independence and Influence The Current State of MCAD Rewriting the Rules of PDM BIM Goes Residential CAD Cartoon Issue Indexes Pleasures of Customization

Cadalyst - July 2008

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