January 12, 1998 Show Report AUTOFACT97: Virtual Manufacturing Has Become a Reality This review filed from the AUTOFACT 97 show in Detroit looks at the emerging trends of virtual manufacturing and concurrent engineering. Among the companies actively using these intelligent technologies are Ford Motor, ABB Flexible Automation, Rover Group and General Motors. Virtual manufacturing and concurrent engineering can no longer be considered as merely pie-in-the-sky buzzword concepts; not with the plethora of case study applications being talked up at AUTOFACT '97, a manufacturing technology conference and exhibition held Nov. 4-6 in Detroit (attendance was in excess of 13,000). True, the tool vendors were out in force again, promoting their software development products, but this time they came accompanied with some customers ready and willing to discuss how they have put these new technologies to real-world use. For instance, Big Three automaker Ford Motor Co. (Dearborn, Mich.; www.ford.com) is using VisFly software from Engineering Animation Inc. (Ames, Iowa; www.eai.com) as part of an ongoing project to adopt EAI's software enterprise-wide on Microsoft Windows NT- and Windows 95-workstations. EAI's VisFly 3D product visualization software, with EAI's new add-on product solutions for measurement, collaboration and 2D image viewing, are being deployed throughout Ford as part of the visualization package EAI is providing to Ford. EAI's VisFly will be tightly integrated with SDRC's Metaphase product data management (PDM) system to enable departments throughout Ford to easily access, view and mark up digital product models. VisFly runs on the Microsoft Windows and UNIX environments, and delivers real-time product visualization technology to departments throughout Ford, including engineering, manufacturing, product support and marketing. The VisFly licenses complement the site license of EAI's VisMockUp digital prototyping software already in use throughout the engineering and design groups at Ford. This agreement will leverage Ford's concurrent engineering initiative while taking advantage of the product visualization capabilities and easy access to digital models available through VisFly. In addition to VisFly, the visualization package EAI is providing to Ford includes add-on products for collaboration, measurement and 2D image viewing. The add-on collaboration product enables multiple users to interact with complete 3D digital models and analyze them in real time. EAI's measurement solution added to VisFly provides a variety of tools to measure features on models. VisFly's add-on 2D image viewing product allows for integration of 2D and 3D data within the same visual environment. Users have the ability to pan and zoom on a 2D drawing and easily compare and analyze the differences in drawing revisions and CAD orders. The deployment of VisFly throughout Ford plays a strategic role in the company's C3P initiative, a project that integrates Ford's computer-aided design, engineering and manufacturing into a global system, resulting in a seamless, unified system that encompasses all stages of vehicle and component development. The system, it is hoped, will lead to improvements in quality and time-to-market while reducing costly late development changes.     Robotic simulation at ABB Meanwhile, ABB Flexible Automation (Zurich, Switzerland; www.abb.se.flexible), a producer of industrial robots and systems, is using computer-aided production engineering (CAPE) software from Tecnomatix Technologies (Novi, Mich.; www.tecnomatix.com) for robotic simulation and off-line programming directly on the manufacturing floor. ABB is using Tecnomatix's ROBCAD/OnSite software to create models of its entire product range in ROBCAD format. Through its S4 virtual controller technology, ABB will provide Tecnomatix with software modules to enable realistic and accurate simulation of ABB robots in ROBCAD/OnSite. "With ROBCAD/OnSite and ABB S4 integrated seamlessly, there will be transparency between the two organizations, providing better support between process design and the shop floor," explained Shlomo Dovrat, Tecnomatix's chairman, at the AUTOFACT show. "Additionally, line down time and cycle time will be reduced, integration time of production lines will take less time, training and hardware costs will be cut, accuracy and quality will improve, and the ability to check and simulate robot programs will be increased, along with communication between production engineers and the shop floor."     Interactive product development Another supplier of virtual manufacturing software - Division Inc. (San Mateo, Calif.; www.division.com) - showcased three customers using its dVISE interactive product simulation tool at AUTOFACT '97. dVISE enables manufacturers, using their own 3D CAD data, to create, visualize, interact with and analyze a design, such as a virtual product. dVISE supports concurrent engineering by providing designers and engineers with interactive technology which enables the review and analysis of a product's final assembly, maintenance and operation while early in the product development process. The software consequently reduces the number of physical prototypes required and can improve ultimate product design. Rover Group, a U.K.-based automotive manufacturer, is using dVISE as a central resource in its design facility for virtual prototyping applications and design reviews. Lever Brothers, a manufacturer of consumer products, is using the concurrent engineering software to review and aid decision-making for its product packaging and marketing. And the OECD Halden Reactor Project is using the software to design, build and test virtual control rooms for nuclear power plants. Yet another tool vendor, Deneb Robotics Inc. (Auburn Hills, Mich.; www.deneb.com), has embarked on a NIST-sponsored project to develop an intelligent agent-based factory scheduling system (see separate article, "Deneb Employs Agents for Virtual Manufacturing Project"). Deneb's software is in use at companies such as General Motors, which is maximizing the efficiency of work cells in the manufacture of car doors to the tune of over $100,000 savings annually on that task alone. In summary, Ford - which uses software from Division and Tecnomatix as well as EAI - considers the "virtual factory" approach to be a significant component of its strategy to reduce prototypes. The automaker estimates virtual manufacturing techniques will result in a 20% reduction in manufacturing-driven changes during the launch of new vehicles, while cutting costs by more than $200 million annually. That kind of eye-popping return-on-investment is responsible for converting virtual manufacturing from a buzzword into an honest-to-goodness trend. The Manufacturing Report © Copyright 1997, 1998 by Lionheart Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. E-mail Editorial Dept: tmr-editorial@lionhrtpub.com Lionheart Publishing, Inc. 2555 Cumberland Parkway, Suite 299, Atlanta, GA 30339 USA Phone: 770-431-0867 | Fax: 770-432-696 E-mail: lpi@lionhrtpub.com Web Design by Premier Web Designs E-mail: lionwebmaster@preweb.com