The Role Of Metrology In The Future Of Manufacturing
How Will Metrology Help Shape the Future of Manufacturing?
At present, across all industries there are trends which tend to focus predominantly on three important attributes, these are manufacturing precision, the introduction of micro-components, and overall cost reductions within the manufacturing and inspection routine. But how can we meet these ever-changing demands? OGP have the answer.
President of Optical Gaging Products (OGP), Stephen Flynn discusses the importance of utilising such trends in rapidly-developing industries, “The acceleration of data-driven manufacturing models (Industry 4.0, Smart Manufacturing, etc.) highlights the need to continually engineer our measurement systems and software so they are practical, useful and easy to use in everyday manufacturing settings.”
“Obviously more complex measurements require more complex solutions, but in general our range of measurement systems and software covers a broad spectrum of use cases, so that regardless of a component’s design or manufacturing process, chances are we have a system that is a good fit with the needs of the user.”
Flynn predicts that the future factory will be a smart facility where both design and manufacture are integrated into a single engineering routine. This will aim to improve pace and quality of manufacturing processes, most likely enabling ‘right first time’ and every time, even on the production of bespoke parts.
“The trend across all advanced manufacturing today is to reduce time to market. The vision of Industry 4.0 and other Smart Manufacturing models is to use manufacturing data (CAD, CAM, PMI, Inspection and Evaluation data) efficiently.”
“For OGP, that means providing ways to quickly integrate production metrology data upstream into the manufacturing and design workflows to enable manufacturers to qualify and stabilise processes more quickly.”
“We are developing software tools that integrate metrology data with both manufacturing CAM software, and upstream to CAD design workflows so that it is possible to model, simulate and adjust designs and machining programmes quickly on the basis of real data.”
With metrology measures being implemented in order to assess fit, function and performance of the part, in the future this will also lead to a positive impact on reducing waste and introducing carbon neutrality.
Furthermore, OGP UK multi-sensor metrology will support the full interconnection between factories to create an industrial base that is completely independent of the scale of production. Combining R&D with production, whilst maintaining low energy consumption and thus reducing impact on the environment.
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