Cycle Time Reduction for CNC Machining Workcells in High-Mix Low-Volume Manufacturing
Name
sun-bsun01-meng-meche-2024-thesis.pdf
Description
Thesis PDF
Size
8.08 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
46d5f19b4df7b230a2fdcf08b3a804f5
Author(s)
Sun, Brandon Christopher
Advisor(s)
Anthony, Brian W.
Date Issued
September 2024
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
The demand for the product under investigation exceeds the available manufacturing capacity, with the CNC milling workcell identified as the bottleneck operation. This research, conducted in an active, high-mix, low-volume production environment, focuses on evaluating and implementing improvements to CNC machining parameters to enhance the workcell's capacity. Key areas of investigation include machining speeds and feeds, depth of cut, machine settings, toolpath strategies, stepover percentages, and alternative tooling. The study specifically targeted the initial roughing operation, which uses a feed mill and is the longest milling process. Addressing the challenges of high mix and low volume, the research successfully optimized machining and CNC programming parameters, reducing total machining cycle times by 25% and resulting in a 33% increase in throughput. Additionally, the methodologies and findings from this work have provided a framework for implementing further milling process improvements outside of the roughing operation, demonstrating their applicability to similar production scenarios.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
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In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
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