Performing a series of test in summer 2020 against the same-tonnage hydraulic machine of similar specification, divisional process development manager Chris Butler reported that both the all-electric cycle times and energy savings surpassed his expectations.
“What we were expecting versus what we documented during the trials was exceptional,” said Butler, who took charge of a project to analyse the age, condition and sustainability of the company’s combined fleet of 419 moulding machines spread across 13 countries. Specifically, he was interested in strategically proving that the improvements that could be realised by taking the all-electric route would enable Essentra Components to maintain its capacity, while also shrinking its machine count and lowering the company’s overall carbon footprint without compromising output, cycle speed or moulding quality.
As a result of the improved process control and the IntElect’s quicker clamp unit/linear movements, the trials revealed an average 24% cycle time saving. “The capacity gains in one test for just particular job where we make 1.6 million parts annually, equated to saving 248 hours production hours annually. That is an exceptional saving,” highlights Butler.
In a separate trial, Sumitomo (SHI) Demag’s technical manager Nick Stockton replicated the exact product processing, shot weight, cycle time and machine tonnage to document energy improvements. Previously consuming 6.31 KWh at an average cost of £0.78 p/h, on the new IntElect this dropped to 4.3KWh. This 32% energy saving was gained without adjusting any of the process steps.
The manual sorting and separation of sprues was always a labour intensive task the generated a lot of waste and was a health and safety risk for workers walking in the vicinity of the machine. Integrating a servo-drive robotic system on to the IntElect has eliminated this manual process. Kidlington’s new robotic handling system funnels parts where they need to go and removes waste plastic on ejection. In a lot size of quarter of a million, the trial reported just 26 lost parts. Reports Butler: “Although we have robotics on other machines, this is our first fully integrated system.”
On the basis of these tests, Kidlington is planning a full switch to all-electric over the next decade.