CNH Industrial in Antwerp, manufacturer of tractor components (mainly rear axles and drive systems), has modernized a twenty-year-old machine tool using ToolScope. Thanks to this monitoring and control system from CERATIZIT, CNH Industrial gains a better understanding of the machining process and can use machine data to reduce cycle times, increase tool life and achieve a reliable production process. The manufacturer of parts for New Holland, Case IH and Steyr tractors was looking for a solution to achieve more efficiency with the existing machine park to meet the growing demand. According to Baptiste Muller, process engineer at CNH Industrial Belgium, the age of the machinery was the biggest challenge in the optimization process. "To reduce cycle times, you can broadly do two things. Either invest in new machines or optimize existing processes. We chose the last option, because despite the fact that some machines are twenty years old, they are still of very good quality. But optimizing these machines with outdated controls and limited computing capacity is not so easy, and certainly not with a limited budget," says Muller. After a search, Muller finally settled on ToolScope from Ceratizit : "Our factory in India has already been using ToolScope for some time and has achieved promising results in reducing tool breakage and increasing tool life. Of course, we also looked at other solutions, but they were all incompatible with our older machines. To test ToolScope in our factory, we started by optimizing one machine."
