Despite rapid advances in manufacturing technology for composite parts, many composite manufacturers are still cutting reinforcements by hand. With the increasing use of automated material cutting, more manufacturers could benefit from adopting this efficient and cost-effective technology.
Automatic cutting has become the standard in the aerospace and marine industries. Why? Because the latest technology can significantly reduce material waste, eliminate unnecessary labor and improve quality. It will also increase throughput. If you are not already using automated cutting, now is the time to re-examine your cutting process and see what this technology can do for your business.
Benefits of Automatic Cutting
Reduced Labor – Machine cutting is faster and more accurate than hand cutting, even with static benchtop machines where the operator manually positions the material to be cut. The conveyor system feeds and spreads the material automatically. These systems require minimal labor to operate and can be switched from one job to another in minutes.
Improved material utilization - Because they are so accurate and repeatable, automatic cutting machines reduce the errors and waste common to manual cutting. In addition, there is easy-to-use nesting software that automatically arranges template shapes in the most material-efficient manner according to the size of the material being cut. Combined, these factors can reduce material waste by as much as 25%.
Quality - Automatic cutting machines are very precise, which will result in a more consistent quality of the final shaped product. This becomes critical as part complexity increases.
Efficiency brings flexibility – the high speed of automated cutting increases throughput, and cutting can occur closer to layup time or even simultaneously in some cases. This brings greater flexibility to scheduling. It also reduces spoilage of materials requiring refrigeration and has a limited shelf life at room temperature.
The AOL Composite Automatic Cutting Machine uses a computer control system, which consists of a computer-controlled conveyor system that feeds material continuously to provide uninterrupted cutting of multiple pieces and large pieces of any length. The cutting pattern form is digitally stored in the machine control which guides the cutting path and conveyor feed for each product.
All cutting is now done on AOL composite automatic cutting machines, eliminating the need for hand cutting at all. This is a major commitment to automation, and the most important cutting advantages of the equipment are cutting speed and material savings.
Once composites manufacturers integrate automated cutting into their workflows, equipment reliability becomes critical. For equipment, this efficient unplanned downtime can be extremely disruptive and costly. It is essential to have equipment that can operate continuously without failure.
While implementing higher forms of automation can be a challenge, if you're cutting or wasting a lot of material, it's time to revisit your automated cutting technology. Automation will reduce your labor costs, increase material utilization and result in consistently higher quality cuts. This is an option you cannot ignore.
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