CAM Data Exchange Forum

An open meeting will be held on June 24 and 25 at the Commonwealth Center for Advanced Manufacturing in Virginia to test new CAM to CAM data exchange translators for Mastercam, Siemens NX and Catia.

The meeting will organize pilot projects for the new translators. CAM to CAM Data Exchange will have many benefits for industry. They include the opportunity to reduce data preparation time, the opportunity to reduce cycle times by measuring and correcting processes on the machine, the opportunity to reduce the life cycle costs of cutting tools, and the opportunity to create a common framework for manufacturing execution, simulation and verification.

The tooling opportunity has been selected for the first pilot because it offers the easiest deployment. The meeting will organize this pilot and is open to all interested parties. In the pilot the participants will send operation descriptions to vendors and receive back tool recommendations and process descriptions that minimize the total cost of tooling. The operation descriptions will be created in a CAM system and sent to the tooling vendors using the new translators. The vendors will read the data into their CAM system and use their expert systems to compute the best process options for their tooling. The result will be exported as another exchange file so that it can be sent back to the customer for incorporation into their solutions.

Attendees are asked to register by June 10th. There will be nominal charges for food and a low-key social event. For more details see the registration documents on the right bar of this web page.

Boxy in Siemens NX

Boxy in Mastercam

Background

The new translators exchange manufacturing data using the STEP-NC standard defined as ISO 10303-238. STEP-NC is a member of the STEP family of standards and extends the design and tolerance specifications included in STEP to include CAM process and resource information. The standard was released by the International Standards Organization (ISO) in Geneva, Switzerland in 2007 and industry users such as Boeing, Airbus, Pratt and Whitney, General Electric, Lockheed Martin, ISCAR, Sandvik and Scania as well as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have been evaluating its applicability to closed loop manufacturing

They declared success in June of 2012 and requested implementation by the CAM vendors at a meeting held at IMTS in September. The meeting was organized by the Organization for Machine Automation and Controls (OMAC). An industry consortium supporting the machine automation and operation needs of manufacturing http://www.omac.org. The CAM vendors for Catia, NX and Mastercam responded and three prototype translators will be demonstrated at the June 24 and 25 meeting in Richmond.

The vendors will continue their developments during 2013 and 2014 and a series of progressively more functional systems will be released for testing by industry. Participation is now being solicited for a series of pilot projects to test the business advantages of the new translators in different scenarios. The pilots being considered include:

1. A supply chain pilot to demonstrate the value of sending CAM data to the supply chain for bidding and production. This pilot will measure the reduction in the data preparation time and the improvement in response quality when requests for quotes and manufacturing orders are sent to suppliers as interoperable technical machining data packages.
2. An on-machine acceptance pilot to demonstrate the value of using CAM data to validate parts in-situ on the machine tool. This pilot will measure the reduction in cycle time, the reduction in wastage, and the enhancements in flexibility when the CNCs make measurements on the machine.
3. A tooling solution pilot to demonstrate the value of including CAM process solutions with tooling recommendations. This pilot will measure the reduction in the total cost of tooling when a vendor can recommend more sophisticated solutions by delivering CAM process data with its tooling recommendations.
4. A networked manufacturing pilot for universities and research projects to demonstrate the value of a common framework for manufacturing execution, simulation and verification. This pilot will measure the enhancements to flexibility, accuracy and safety when manufacturing requirements (PMI), manufacturing processes and manufacturing resources are shared on the network.

The tooling pilot has been selected for first deployment because it requires the least change to existing practices and solutions.

The meeting is open to all interested in participating in the pilots. Attendees are asked to register by June 10th. There will be nominal charges for food and a low-key social event. For more details see the registration details on the side of this page.