Minimising production times to ensure competitiveness is one of the most important challenges in the automotive industry – Henry Ford recognised this over a century ago. After decades of optimisation, it is difficult to reduce machining times further while maintaining the same level of quality. Nevertheless, Volkswagen (VW), near the German town of Kassel, has managed to achieve this in its gearbox production facility using Kapp Niles gear grinding machines that are available in the UK from the Engineering Technology Group (ETG).
The VW plant in Baunatal is one of the larger German locations of the enterprise with a workforce of about 17,000. Its production focuses mainly on gearboxes in ten different series. Gearing centres from Kapp Niles are being deployed on 50% of the manufacturing lines. Kapp Niles is primarily known as a specialist for hob grinding with dressable tools.
880 gearboxes per day
Kapp Niles machines are also applied in the production of the DL382 dual-clutch gearbox for Audi. A total of sixteen gearings is required to shift the seven gears with this type of gearbox – ten ground and six honed. The production unit runs 24 hours a day, 5 to 6 days per week. VW strives to achieve an EPEI (every part every interval) value of 1 day in the production unit. This means that all components can be produced on each day for the aforementioned gearbox. This streamlined production requires seamless processes and a high degree of flexibility. Technical clerk, Christian Hahn, is in charge of the production process of the DL382 dual-clutch gearbox. He describes the production process: “We have five gearing centres from Kapp Niles in the wheel production unit and two more in the shaft production unit. To achieve an EPEI value of 1 day, we change over the machine in the wheel production unit twice a day.”
The challenge with flexible production is the short cycle times. With an output of 880 gearboxes per day, one machine in wheel production must produce 1,760 parts per day. Including all set-up times and failures, yielding a line cycle time of 34 seconds. An average line cycle time is about 39 to 40 seconds. Bernd Kümpel, application technician at Kapp Niles, analyses these figures: “Saving 5 to 6 seconds per cycle does not sound like a lot at first, but together it can be a 15% reduction. If I consider that at least 40% of segments cannot be influenced, I have to reduce the actual process time by 30 to 40%. Seen in this way, 34 seconds a real challenge.”
Saving precious seconds during changeover
A total of seven Kapp Niles machines are being deployed at VW. The machines include three KX 100 DYNAMIC, two KX 260 TWIN in wheel production and two KX 160 TWIN in shaft production. Christian Hahn and Bernd Kümpel agreed from the very beginning that the desired cycle time could only be achieved with a combination of several measures. To minimise daily set-ups, Christian Hahn makes sure that the wheels to be produced on one machine have boreholes of the same size. Thus, he has to change over the machine, but not the clamping tools. The remaining set-up time is minimised by the set-up concept of the KX 100 DYNAMIC. For one machine, he needs just 20 to 25 minutes. “The semi-automatic set-up makes the KX 100 DYNAMIC extremely user-friendly,” says Bernd Kümpel, describing the process.
Additional visual aid is available in the form of a menu guide and an easy-to-understand cycle on the machine controller. By completing the step-by-step process and the acknowledgement screen, the operator ensures that no work steps are executed incorrectly and high-cost failures are prevented.
The tools are dressed using full profile rolls, allowing all threads of the cylindrical worm to be approached and moulded simultaneously. Thus, with a 5-pass full profile roll, the dressing time can be reduced by more than half without compromising on quality.
The integrated measurement system is another important time-saver. Christian Hahn explains the advantage: “After each changeover, quality measurement has to be made outside the machine. We continue to require this, but I can already check the basic, quality-related parameters with the integrated measurement sensor in the machine itself. It saves a lot of time as we can start production before the results of the external measurement are available.” The integrated measurement system of the Kapp Niles machines accelerates the restart process considerably. The external measurement merely checks more teeth and generates the measurement report to monitor the gear.
Open for new machine tool technology
The search for optimisation potential also includes the actual grinding process. Cubitron™ II machine tools by 3M™ show a highly promising approach, with geometrically specific triangular-shaped cutter heads, compared to conventionally dressable grinding wheels.
For this purpose, Kapp Niles provided relevant preparatory work with a large number of grinding tests in-house to be able to use the benefits of this machine tool with the DL382 components. Bernd Kümpel adds: “With CII, you can remove a considerable amount of shavings without any thermal damage to the component. This way, we reduce consumption time by 30% compared to other grinders.”
Saving space and money
Production is characterised by belt chaining that goes through the entire hall. Available space is limited, hence, the highly compact KX 100 DYNAMIC machines are the preferred choice. This machine type has two separate rotatable mounted columns, each with vertically movable pick-up axes with one workpiece spindle. While a workpiece is being machined, the other pick-up axis places the machined workpiece and loads a non-machined part onto the workpiece spindle. The workpiece is aligned outside the work area. This allows the workpiece spindle, already accelerated to machining speed, to be swivelled in the work area, keeping non-production times to a minimum.
A transfer unit does the loading and unloading from the conveyor belt. Bernd Kümpel says: “We usually move with the belt directly below the machine. However, this was not possible here. With the transfer unit, we compensate for height and distance from the belt to the machine. An integrated automation solution would have been significantly more expensive, at about 25% of the priceof the machine,” addsBernd Kümpel. “A simple transfer unit costs less than 10% of the machine price.”
Planned success
Christian Hahn says: “Throughout the process, we were convinced by the machine concept and managed to overcome any obstacles together. The cycle time was a critical aspect. But, we did it.” The commissioning included the machine capability analysis, where 100 components of each type are produced and measured 100%.
Apart from the cycle time, other difficulties were overcome in the shaft production and Christian Hahn describes it as follows: “The shafts are hollow and comparatively unstable. This called for a special clamping technique and a machine that can absorb the unavoidable vibration in the grinding process. The KX 160 TWIN can do this due to its solid design and construction which in turn helps to achieve better grinding quality.”