Opening the black box - SmartCMS at Fiasa

Why is a good part good and a bad part bad? Jens Hunke is focused on improving the understanding and monitoring processes of die-casting cells. His foundry, FIASA in Northern Spain, has become a pioneer in the area of Industry 4.0, equipping a cell with SmartCMS (Smart Cell Management System) together with Bühler.

The automotive industry is a cost-driven market. Success mainly hinges on low process costs,” says Jens Hunke. The CEO of Fundiciones Inyectadas Alavesas, S.A. (FIASA) knows just how important it is to keep processes and costs under control at the foundry. For over 46 years, his company, located in the green hills of the Basque country, has directly and indirectly supplied virtually all European car brands with drivetrain components. In the current situation especially, with the automotive industry in a state of upheaval, it is essential for suppliers to offer a wide range of services and prepare for the future.

“The challenge is figuring out what direction the market is going to take,” says Hunke. After all: Fewer cars with pure combustion engines mean fewer cast parts for the drivetrain. In times like these, FIASA will invest in a new die-casting cell. But not just any die-casting cell – the new one should set benchmarks in terms of overall equipment effectiveness (OEE), that is, availability, performance and quality. “We can gain market shares by optimizing our OEE,” explains Hunke.

Both project partners had the same goal in mind right from the start: higher availability and lower scrap rates in FIASA production. Together, they aimed to gather insights in order to optimize Smart-CMS. “It was important for Bühler and FIASA to have the same focus – that is driving the Industry 4.0 initiative forward,” underscores Oliver Walter, Project Manager at Bühler. Both sides were ready to gradually work towards an ideal solution in two week development cycles while remaining in close communication. 
 

This means that the system can better identify the causes for scrap parts and possibly prevent them altogether. If employees from quality control detect a bad part in the X-ray machine, the system operators can check the data matrix to see whether a process parameter has gone off course, enabling them to keep better control over the parameter in the future. After all, the later a bad part surfaces in the production chain, the more costs it generates in follow-up processes.

The goal is to discover bad parts far before quality control. “SmartCMS helps our customers collect quality data and define windows for parameters that ensure high-quality parts,” says Walter.

Since the spring of 2019, the cell has been up and running in the halls of FIASA, providing initial insights. SmartCMS is a plain touch panel that acts as a control center, or the brain of the cell, so to say. Much of the process data from the individual peripherals is visible to system operators at a central location for the first time ever.

“Access to this data requires close collaboration with all partners that supplied a part of the peripherals,” says Walter. To harness insights from collected data, the engineering team at Bühler installed even more sensors into the cell. And the result is a ton of data: each day, 1.42 gigabytes are collected and provided on the Bühler Insights IoT platform.

For the die caster, this mass of data means more training. After learning the ropes of the system, employees can work applying a more targeted and efficient approach. Manual testing is no longer required, and they can start or stop the entire cell from a central location, in addition to confirming messages or changing parameters. The variety of data not only makes processes more transparent – it also helps understand wear. The worst enemy to availability is unplanned malfunctions forcing cell downtime. “By contrast, if the cell says ‘imminent malfunction’ thanks to SmartCMS, we can complete the required maintenance or troubleshooting during a planned break,” Hunke explains.