The challenge: quickly measure complex parts with numerous tolerances
Safran Landing Sytems, located in Montreal, Canada, produces landing gear housings for medium and large commercial aircraft. These parts are particularly characterized by their large dimensions, the significant distortions induced during hardening, and the presence of deep cylinders with complex orientations.
These specific features make the inspection of these parts particularly difficult with conventional indexable heads – cutting tools with multiple cutting edges to reduce downtime on the production line.
What’s more, these parts require a high number of tolerances to be checked: this imposes a considerable volume of measurements and leads to long cycle times on the coordinate measuring machines (CMMs) used.
The discovery of Revo technology as a key factor
As part of the transition of one of their machining processes to 5-Axis strategies, it became clear to the Safran Landing Systems teams that the adoption of a Revo 5-Axis head (Renishaw) could bring about a comparable transformation in their inspections.
” An in-depth evaluation of available software solutions was carried out to identify those capable of completely overhauling our inspection processes, while guaranteeing a high level of performance,” explains Jean-Marc Tremblay, CNC / CMM Support and Development Manager at Safran Landing Systems.
The objective: to reduce inspection cycle times by 50%, while maintaining Safran’s characteristic excellence in quality. The chosen solution: combine the Revo head with Metrolog measurement software. Metrolog is one of the only software solutions capable of integrating all REVO sensors, and offers intuitive programming thanks to its numerous graphic wizards,” explains Valentin Joseph, Regional Key Account Manager at Metrologic DCS. . Son moteur de programmation puissant, permettant d’adresser les scénarios les plus complexes, couplé avec son ergonomie d’utilisation, fait de Metrolog un logiciel de référence pour exploiter le plein potentiel de la REVO. »
An association that exceeds initial expectations
In addition to the significant reduction in CMM measurement times, Safran Landing Systems has reduced the number of set-ups and interventions required of its operators, accelerated the evaluation and clearance of parts for subsequent stages of production, and provided the Material Review Board (MRB) with the required information more rapidly in the event of non-conformity. In addition, programming and analysis time has been significantly reduced, resulting in optimization of operational, support and programming staff.
The migration of all parts to Revo technology has been completed, and Safran Landing Systems is about to embark on its new phase of continuous improvement to integrate lessons learned and push the boundaries of their processes even further.
Read the original case study here.
” We are convinced that our technology partners – Metrologic DCS, Renishaw and Wenzel, to name but a few – will continue to innovate and support us in this approach. In technical terms, the contribution of Metrologic DCS is decisive: Metrolog fully exploits the capabilities of the Revo head, thanks to native integration of all sensors and optimized programming for 5-axis trajectories. This combination enables us to significantly reduce our cycle times, improve repeatability on complex geometries and make our measurement methods more reliable.“
Jean-Marc Tremblay
Metrologic DCS combines best-in-class industrial metrology and dimensional engineering expertise. Metrologic Group contributes its best-in-class universal 3D metrology software, multi-sensor measurement execution, and interoperability across machines and technologies. DCS is the world leader in dimensional engineering and variation analysis. Together, these complementary capabilities create a unique, end-to-end approach to quality.