Lighthouse Systems - Dealing With The Complex Demands Of The Aerospace Industry

The overriding concerns governing manufacturing in the aerospace industry are safety and in-service efficiency, particularly where the air travel market is concerned. The problem is exacerbated by working in a regulated environment, with increasing complexity in design, increased collaborative engineering, new materials and the drive for cost savings.

Managing complexity

There have been incredible innovations at all levels in the aerospace industry, from new materials such as carbon fibre in aero structures, to new engine designs driving massive gains in in-flight utilisation and new technologies across the board.

Perhaps surprisingly for such a sophisticated industry, aerospace manufacture has until quite recently employed less automation than most other branches of engineering. The relatively low volumes have provided fewer opportunities to employ repeat operations. This is especially true of the military aircraft market.

The volume of data involved, however, is typically very large because of the many thousands of individual features of components, all of which must be verified as conforming to specification, with a particular focus on safety-critical features, and to downstream part-assembly in collaborative working.

Challenges
The expanding air travel market has driven growth in the aerospace sector and its supply chain, spawning masses of associated data that needs to be organised, recorded and maintained for decades. This poses major challenges for aerospace manufacturers.

Much of the data is generated with automated measuring systems, in particular coordinate measuring machines (CMMs). These systems are programmed to measure complex shapes against product specifications. The output – usually text based - is a crucial element of the production record. Many companies have devised in-house solutions to store this data to meet traceability requirements and provide limited reporting.

Whilst the data is readily available piece by piece, it is often very difficult to analyse the history. This hinders the ability to analyse product data by feature and very difficult to support on-going process management.

Some parts are produced in low volumes; this makes any kind of statistical analysis difficult. But techniques can be used to pull common data together for analysis, for example, all holes with the same specification or surface finishes.

In all, many millions of measured values have to be managed and matched up to part numbers. Not least, they need to be analysed in a consistent and usable way. Where it is possible to achieve this, it supports vastly improved decision-making on the part of process owners and engineering.

Critical issues
Aerospace manufacturers are now demanding systems that capture the data that will enable them to address and make informed decisions on a whole range of issues:

• Ensuring that everyone involved in production can reliably use and confirm the active specification following specification revisions.
• Critical-feature reports need to be read and reviewed to develop cost-reduction programmes. These then have to be monitored using analysis reports to establish progress. 
• Criticality needs have to be mapped so that attention is focused where most needed.
• With multi-site manufacturing becoming the norm it is now essential for collaborative data analysis to be supported easily, whilst ensuring security and integrity.
• Reducing reworking and concessions to improve the bottom line. 
• Understanding and getting more from tooling, materials and operators. 
• Designing processes to have high first-time pass rates, without incurring scrap of high-value materials.

Shopfloor-Online – an MES solution for the jet age
Shopfloor-Online MES is a modular Factory Information System from Lighthouse Systems that is quickly and easily configured to support aerospace manufacturers. It is web-based software that provides total visibility of the equipment and processes of an entire plant or network of sites, collecting and reporting accurate data in real time without the need for operator intervention.

Shopfloor-Online MES can integrate with all the existing equipment and data sources associated with aerospace manufacturing and CMMs in particular. Usually most aerospace businesses will have at least two suppliers of CMMs; using Shopfloor-Online MES means that just one analysis package is needed to manage all the data. External links are supported to enable data transfer to other software applications if necessary.

Shopfloor-Online MES also knows all the product specifications and the latest revisions of checks to be carried out; as and when the lines change over to other products, it knows the checks that need to be done and the specs to check against.

For manual checks the operator is guided through the process, ensuring that the quality plan is executed. The measurement values transfer directly from the gauges to Shopfloor-Online MES; all measurements are tested against specifications and SPC control rules. Any violations are flagged and operators prompted to record any remedial actions.

Key benefits of a Shopfloor-Online MES application
The integrated data capture capability provided by Shopfloor-Online MES is instrumental in delivering substantial benefits that are key to allowing aerospace manufacturers to sharpen their processes and their competitive edge.

Shopfloor-Online MES gives them a clear process view normalised over all the products and production. Automatic monitoring of the features of all components used in a business and listing those either not conforming to specification or of a low capability saves huge amounts of time.

Time is also saved through having access in seconds to data from any part of the process. The same capability means you save more time and money when called to demonstrate compliance and capability and by passing audits first time.

Confirmation that all checks have been completed and in the correct order is given and advance warning of trends and events makes it possible to avoid problems such as tool wear.

Machine productivity is increased too. Giving engineers and operators the confidence to work closer to target means higher first-time pass rates. The Lighthouse software also enables performance levels to be maintained by benchmarking key aspects of the process and alerting any variance.

Further productivity improvements come from being able to select the best suppliers and tooling based on performance analyses from shop floor.

This is a summary of the way in which a Lighthouse Shopfloor-Online MES application provides everyone in a manufacturing environment with the information to make informed decisions. The immediacy and accuracy of the feedback has a major effect on raising and maintaining end-product quality.