Corporate Profile
Mitsubishi Agricultural Machinery (MAM), part of Mitsubishi Heavy Industry Group, designs, manufactures and sells agricultural machinery. To better meet the needs of a rapidly changing market, Mitsubishi adopted a strategy known as concurrent engineering, using Lattice Technology’s advanced 3D data format called XVL.
Business Challenges
Concurrent engineering is a work methodology that promotes a parallelization of tasks. For example, job functions such as design engineering and manufacturing engineering are integrated, which allows workers to reduce the time needed to bring new products to market.
Using the XVL solution, MAM dramatically changed the workflow of their assembly process and work instructions to take advantage of concurrent engineering. Visualization in 3D with the related instructions of the assembly process enables users to understand the process quickly and easily.
Business Strategy and Objectives
To enable this concurrent engineering, all the CAD files for the complete product needed to be brought together into a single file. MAM's typical products are comprised of hundreds of files, and together the combined file sizes are in the gigabytes. CAD systems generally cannot accommodate this.
XVL solves this problem with its ultra-lightweight format. XVL is typically one-half of one percent (.5%) of the native CAD model size, while still maintaining accuracy. This ultra-lightweight format allows users to combine extremely large assemblies with thousands of parts on standard PC desktops and laptops, as well as on mobile devices. In addition to being ultra-lightweight, XVL is uniquely suited for creating enhanced, intelligent models that can include animations, annotations, PMI (including GD&T) and work instructions.
Using XVL, MAM can now operate product design and industrial engineering simultaneously. This type of concurrent engineering (Figure 1) allows them to reduce lead time from design to production.
CHANGING WORKFLOW TO PRODUCE FASTER
MAM struggled with the problem of developing and producing products fast enough to meet the market needs. To produce faster, they set out to change their workflow. Prior to XVL, production preparation was done after the assembly process design, which left no time to tune the assembly process.
Also, work instructions at MAM were based on the industrial engineer’s experience and knowledge. Engineers would first check the part geometry from blueprints. Next, they would simulate the order of the assembly process, based on their experience. Workers would then proceed with assembly process definition and work instructions development.
This type of workflow demands many years of experience. Succession planning (transition from expert workers to novice workers) was a serious issue. Passing skills and knowledge of veteran workers to young workers was vital and required long-term planning.
To solve this problem, MAM turned to XVL Studio, Lattice Technology’s core authoring tool for turning 3D design data into 3D manufacturing data. XVL Studio enables digital manufacturing, digital mock-up (DMU), and technical illustration across the enterprise–directly from 3D data.
Using XVL Studio, MAM digitally created the assembly process. The assembly process was then verified digitally within XVL Studio using the accurate 3D model (Figure 2).
With this new workflow, workers simulate the process and consider the tooling and jigs needed by using the actual part geometry--even when the model is still in design. XVL allows visualization of the assembly process, enabling the designers to see the product design from the perspective of an experienced assembly process designer.
PLEASED WITH XVL’S INNOVATION
“Introducing Lattice Technology’s XVL solution has resulted in motivation to change the workflow of the assembly process and work instructions,” said Masashi Kawamoto, Development Management Division at MAM. Kawamoto went on to say that feedback from assembly process designers has been positive. “They are pleased with the innovation of the XVL solution.”
XVL is now a crucial tool for the assembly process designers at MAM. Digital documentation of the assembly process was adopted without any difficulties. Using XVL, work instructions (attached to part geometry and animations) can be easily added. Lattice Technology offers multiple choices for consuming the interactive 3D and associated information such as work instructions. These choices include Microsoft Excel, interactive web pages, and a browser-based Windows application. MAM uses the free add-on for Microsoft Excel (see Figure 3 below). When viewing the assembly in Excel, the part name is selected and the matching part in the 3D model is highlighted.
Users can save view information such as the orientation, layout, and camera angle of a 3D model. This feature, called Snapshot, can restore the position of a 3D model with only a single click. Users can optimize their work instructions by creating snapshots that suit their purpose (Figure 3).
Summary
Change is often difficult for any organization. However, using Excel to distribute 3D models and associated data was accepted without issue. If the change had required modifying the entire workflow, the engineers at MAM may not have been as eager to implement XVL.
That being said, using XVL for documenting work instructions has naturally led to an overhaul of the assembly process workflow. Kawamoto concluded, “Workers might think that introducing XVL was a small change; however, when you focus on the importance of accurate work instructions, delivered with a tool that people are accustomed to using, you will realize that XVL has brought great change.” The change to use XVL in combination with Excel has allowed concurrent engineering to become a reality at MAM. This new workflow allows MAM to bring new products to market faster.
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