"We pick up where others leave off!"

Foundry Kalmbach counts on constantly highest quality due to automated processes

Foundry components can be found nearly in all areas of life – from heat sinks for power electronics via sanitary and iron fittings up to a multitude of applications in the automotive industry. The Kalmbach foundry in Velbert developed from a small family owned business in the 1960's to a powerful precision die casting supplier with approx. 100 employees today. Automation with Reis robots considerably contributed to increase the product quality.

 

If you enter the halls of Kalmbach you'll be surprised.  It is friendly, light and clean – which is not always a matter of course in foundries. "Regular preventive maintenance and cleanness are part of the company philosophy", explains Thomas Kalmbach. "However, the emerging image often helped us to convince new customers of our capacity with regard to sophisticated castings.

 

Fully automated die casting machines with Reis robots and Reis presses for aluminum castings.

 

 

Sophisticated means for instance zinc casting housings with very thin wall thickness or aluminum connectors with a cast and not reworked fine thread. Keywords: Dimensional accuracy and reproducibility. Besides this, of course, the automotive industry is an important customer. Here and there mainly surface components are concerned. The maximum casting weight since investment in new automated die casting cells end of 2008 is up to 8.500 g."

 

Company owner Thomas Kalmbach in front of the new investment, a fully automated die casting machine.

 

Surface – and thus, visible – components don't pardon any failures in the casting, since those become really evident during subsequent future surface finishing. To achieve a reproducible quality as perfect as possible, automation with a first used Reis trim press and a new 6-axes Reis robot for removal of the castings from the die was launched in the year 2004. 

 

 

Reis robot type RV in an automatic die casting cell.  Robust, foundry-specific design, space-saving kinematics, field proven and reliable.

 

 

Due to recommendations, Reis Robotics was involved from the very beginning with the sales engineer Hans-Peter Brohm. "And that's exactly where a good piece of success story begins from our point of view", adds Thomas Kalmbach.  "The consulting capacities of Reis exceed the proper sales by far, because they also have know-how about our business. Parallel to the successive extension to eight automated casting cells today they made the proposal to optimize the arrangement of casting systems and robots as well as procedures in the halls according to their space requirements. This consulting performance alone was fruitful after a short time already and made us more flexible for the future."

 

Unloading, checking, cooling, and trimming

Each casting cell consists of a die casting machine make Frech, a Reis robot type RV and a CASTcheck sensor unit to check the casting for integrity after removal, a CASTcooling cooling basin and a hydraulic three-column trim press SEP,

                                                  

Cooling and check of the casting in the cell space-saving, with very short ways, quick and reliable.

The Reis trim press SEP in three-column design can be set reliably and quickly.

 

also from Reis. 'All supplied by one source' with the peripheral equipment was important for Kalmbach, because this is the only way to make sure that the individual system components can 'communicate' at best. Besides this, a signal exchange is made with the ejector system of the casting machine.  The robot seizes the part to be ejected at the gate and accompanies the ejector movement synchronously from the very beginning. After the machine has been opened, the robot gets the signal to move into the open die and to seize the casting. After the message 'gripper closed' the casting machine on the other hand gets a signal to move the ejector forward. With this movement the robot and the casting are displaced until the part is free for unloading. This does not only prevent load impacts on the robot, but also saves the casting and prevents delicate casting compounds to be damaged or possibly to become distorted after ejection. This advantageous software function avoids failures during deposit of the casting compound into a processing station or into a trim tool.

 

CASTeject: Software function for the gentle removal of the parts from the mold, synchronous with the ejectors.

 

After ejection the robot guides the casting along an infrared sensor unit to check whether all overflows are available on the casting.  From this you can conclude that no casting residues remained in the die. In the next step the robot immerses the part into the cooling basin for an individually calculated time to bring it to the Reis trim press then. The press room is accessible from all sides, so that setting works can be done quickly in case of changing castings. With its large empty spaces and table apertures the press allows an automatic scrap removal, being a condition for a high availability of the cell. For optimum design of the cutting tools Kalmbach relied on the many years of experience of Reis. Automatic trimming does not only simplify the subsequent further processing, but also saves storage area. How? Simply due to the fact that with castings produced in large numbers more pieces can be filled into the prepared grid boxes if they have their compact final shape.

 

Keyword change of the produced casting: Each die change of course requires an adapted programming of robot and trim press.  "The intuitive operator surface

 

Programming assistant CASTassist for the quick user programming in the caster's language, guarantees an easy, quick, and safe operation.

 

of the Reis software CASTassist supports the work of our employees with clear, foundry-specific pictographs and thus reduces setting times", so Thomas Kalmbach. "And another thing was effected by this easy operation: After initial skepticism, we were able to convince our employees of the advantages of the use of robots. Since everyone cooperated, no one had to be fired, but we could further qualify and motivate the colleagues. Suddenly the enthusiasm was so big that employees took the robot documentation home to extend their knowledge – and that voluntarily. Today each employee looks after two systems, since those are mostly automated.

 

Quality considerably increased

The proper reason for the use of robots from Reis for Kalmbach, however, was not only the faster processing of orders, but the considerable increase of quality and reduction of costs due to the automation. Thus, not only the system downtimes could be largely reduced due to the constant automatic cycle, but in particular the lifetimes of the dies were doubled due to a considerable minimization of the temperature variations in the die. Since the dies keep their dimensional stability longer and require less maintenance, Kalmbach considerably saves costs and can deliver to the sophisticated customers just what they require – perfect quality. The comment of Thomas Kalmbach on this: "For this very reason the complete process must be automated as far as possible, since the tool and die costs are hard to sell."

 

The examples show what delicate products are being cast at Kalmbach.

 

 

The relation zinc to aluminum casting presently still being about 70:30, Thomas Kalmbach sees an equalization of the shares in the near future, last but not least due to the fact that Kalmbach with own die construction and the high degree of automation succeeded in casting high quality, delicate objects from aluminum alloys which recently still seemed hardly imaginable. With the production flexibility – also with refinement and assembly of products – Kalmbach opened up the most versified industries as customers and hence defies the depression which has hit the automotive industry so hard. Very countercyclically, the enterprise carried out a great number of new orders in these tough times.

 

Robots in operation

Since introduction of the first Reis robot in 2004 Kalmbach not only trusts in the robot systems, but also in the engineering competence of Reis Robotics and is sure that the consulting capacities during planning and start-up have an important share in the quality of the created solution. Thomas Kalmbach: "The decision was right, because there were no problems worth mentioning so far. From the very beginning everything is running as desired and technical questions in most cases could be clarified on the phone. And when a small switch failed during operation, we noticed how useful the installed remote maintenance of Reis is. The Reis experts identified the problem from Obernburg, delegated a technician, and the very next day already the system was operative again.

 

Result

The automation solutions from Reis in the foundry Kalmbach proved to be the right step for the company. In a bit more than four years, they expanded from the first robot up to eight automated cells today. The extremely high quality caused Thomas Kalmbach's saying "We pick up where others leave off!" Experience revealed that the decision for very complex, delicate and sensitive casting products proved to be right in the competition. Kalmbach considers his company as pure service provider with accordingly high quality requests – in every respect. For this reason there are also further modern systems installed in Velbert works for a perfect surface finish of the castings and work stations for mechanical machining, assembly and fabrication tasks.