At Rolls Royce, WorkNC promotes collaboration and efficiency

The woodshop at Rolls-Royce Motor Cars’ Goodwood plant relies on skilled craftsmen, offering a range of veneers and several different types of finish such as cross banding, bonded to a solid wood and aluminium substrate, and designed to suit the individual requirements of its customers.

<< Rolls-Royce has reported that through having WorkNC on-site for 5-axis machining, turnaround times have been greatly reduced and productivity and quality maximised >>

To create the interior trim, the personalised designs are created in CATIA and then transmitted to the woodshop for manufacture. Here, the engineers specify the fixturing required to hold the part, ready for cutting and trimming on the three Reichenbacher 5-axis routing machines.

Initially, Rolls-Royce relied on BMW in Germany to programme the machines using its WorkNC systems. By introducing WorkNC in the UK the company has been able to carry out the programming itself, which has had an enormous impact on the turnaround times it can achieve. To further improve productivity, Rolls-Royce has been working in partnership with local pattern makers Frank R. Hay and Sons. When the Goodwood plant opened Rolls-Royce required additional resources for fixture manufacture. By working with Frank R. Hay, it can get a very fast response through local collaboration.

Formed in 1952, Frank R. Hay has an enviable reputation for pattern making. By diversifying its customer base in the 1980’s, and introducing CNC machining in 2002 it was in an ideal position to serve the new Rolls-Royce facility. Adrian Hay, Chairman and Managing Director, said, “Rolls-Royce approached us to carry out site work, making and altering fixtures to provide a more effective solution than sending them back to Germany. With the introduction of WorkNC at our factory, we can now work even more closely together.” WorkNC is used in the office and on the shop floor to programme its Geiss 5-axis, Hass, and Mazak machining centres. Additionally, the company writes and supplies 5-axis programmes to machine parts on Rolls-Royce“s Reichenbacher routers. Grant Keates, NC Programmer for Frank R. Hay added, “Because we are both using WorkNC we can import CATIA CAD models in the same way, and share WorkNC workzones, making it much easier to work collaboratively.” Rolls-Royce is experiencing similar benefits as it can share WorkNC methods and workzones with both BMW and Frank R. Hay. Between the three companies and the additional support supplied by Sescoi, it has been able to develop some valuable techniques which have not only solved problems but also enabled it to become more productive. It is in daily contact with Frank R Hay, which has become an important contributor to the production process.

The 5-axis capabilities of WorkNC have been crucial to the success of Frank R Hay. Previously, it was limited to 3-axis machining. Now the 5-axis pocketing and 5-axis rolling toolpaths, in particular, have enabled it to produce trimming programmes for Rolls-Royce and other clients. Adrian Hay added, “We have experienced some impressive growth. Now 20% of our business is intellectual, supplying modelling and 5-axis CNC programming services in addition to patterns and fixtures. Having the capability in-house has enabled us to expand our business and removed our reliance on external suppliers.”

Rolls-Royce, makes use of WorkNC’s Auto 5 toolpath. Unique to Sescoi, it automatically transforms a 3-axis toolpath into 5-axis. It is additionally used by the company to make the 5-axis toolpaths created by WorkNC even smoother. Due to the bespoke requirements at Rolls-Royce every part is different, and requires project managing with new fixturing and an individual production process. Engineers at Rolls-Royce has reported that the time savings gained through having WorkNC onsite, and the level of collaboration which has been achieved with BMW and Frank R Hay, has released much more time to spend optimising production and controlling the supplier chain. WorkNC has helped them to complete special components far more quickly, and at the same time maximise productivity and quality.