stp: mould management

The following is required for the successful development of a project to automate die and mould management within a production plant:

• The powerful STP Framework, which can provide a series of objects implementing the basic functions to be personalized according to the customer’s specifications.

• STAIN’s specific experience acquired in over 10 years developing successful projects for leading businesses.

• Advice on how to develop a project that can create value for the business, using STAIN’s proven method, which starts with a detailed analysis of the existing situation and goes on to develop a solution using framework functions to handle each company’s specific requirements.

The main functions of the STP are:

• Tool master records. The STP allows a census of all the equipment (dies, die holder, matrices, inserts) based on type, status, location, supplier, nominal life and residual life. Powerful filters are used to determine which and how many tools are available.

• Tool tracking. The STP tracks how each tool is used throughout its life to establish which presses it has been mounted on and which tools it has been associated with, in order to identify malfunctions, stoppages and non-conformities recorded.

• Registration of interventions during production. The STP tracks all maintenance operations on tools mounted on machines rendered necessary during the moulding campaign. It records the date/time, type of intervention and operator, and takes a photograph of the equipment to allow a target defect analysis.

• End-of-moulding check-list. The STP proposes a check-list to help the operator with end-of-moulding activities when the equipment is removed from the press.

• Tool maintenance. The TSP tracks all internal and external maintenance carried out on the tooling, and compares its nominal and actual life to allow an accurate assessment of suppliers and dimensional and aesthetic defects, and to implement preventive actions to allow continuous improvement of the moulding process.

• The STP provides means for verifying the availability of the equipment, its location (even if at subcontractors’ facilities) and status to avoid production and tooling managers having to carry out lengthy and costly search operations.

• Mould sheet printing. The system can print mould sheets with a detailed list of defined components and the number of articles produced per cavity.

• Data exportability. The data processed by the system and presented in the query grids can be exported to Excel for local processing by the user.