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moldmakingtechnology.com 33 machining, electrode milling, EDM and design in-house," Fassnacht says. "Things like plates, rails and other standard parts we buy from other suppliers, which helps our small team to concentrate on the essential tasks." For the same reason, Fassnacht has continuously invested in automation. The factory's centerpiece is a five-axis Röders machining center that mills electrodes and other mold com- ponents, a CNC measuring machine and two EDM machines from German company Zimmer + Kreim, which has supplied Fassnacht's handling system as well. The linear automation system is called Chameleon. It features magazines on a length of 7.5 meters, offering space for 600 electrodes and 21 workpiece pallets. The Chameleon handling robot moves through the flexible manufacturing system on an expandable rail system and can handle pallets from 500 by 500 millimeters and 400 by 600 millimeters. "We first thought we'd be less flexible with this automa- tion solution, but we soon realized that it pays off to invest in automation and batch-size-one production, even for a small company like ours" Fassnacht says. "Some of our molds require up to 400 different electrodes, which are hard to handle without automation. Moreover, we used to waste a lot of time when we had to interrupt an EDM process for urgent design changes. New setups and machine changeovers caused machine downtime and extra work for the operators. Today, we stop the EDM process, and the handling system tempo- rarily stores the workpiece until the machine is ready to fin- ish the machining process." Increase in Productivity The automated production cell also contributed to an increase in productivity, even though Fassnacht never devi- ated from his decision to keep his company at a size of 20 employees. He says, "One reason for our increased efficiency is higher throughput. The other is improved quality and higher machining speeds thanks to the new EDM machines, which are about five times faster than our old ones. Spotting times have been reduced, which has a huge impact on our labor costs and our ability to deliver molds to our custom- ers more quickly." Ten years ago, Fassnacht produced 30–40 molds per year. Now, depending on complexity, the mold shop annually makes as many as 80 injection molds that weigh as much as 5 tons. While Fassnacht admits that his company has grown from a craftsman's workshop to a modern mold shop that is inspired by industrial manufacturing principles, it is the peo- ple who make the difference. "We need automation to remain competitive, but the key to success is what happens before and after a flexible manufacturing system. The most impor- tant factor is the mold design and whether time and money are lost for rework and post-processing. What set us apart are our smart mold solutions and the people behind them." Investment in Additive Technology Part of Fassnacht's smart mold solutions are additively- manufactured mold inserts with conformal cooling. "Molds should earn money in the injection molding process in terms of cost per part, especially when we are talking about large volumes," Fassnacht says. "Our conformal cooling solutions add value for the injection molder. Very often, however, our customer is not the end-user, but a contractor with a fixed budget. In those cases, it takes some effort and cycle time calculations to convince them to invest in an additively-made insert. Other customers demand designs with conformal cooling channels. Historically, these molds reach achievable and realistic reductions in cycle time in series production of up to 40 percent." Fassnacht came across the selective laser melting tech- nology as early as 1995. When Concept Laser exhibited its first M3 linear machine as the world's first industrial 3D metal printing system at Euromold in Frankfurt in 2001, Fassnacht decided to use this technology to create inserts with conformal cooling and hybrid parts, where the complex geometries of the mold insert are "fused" onto a convention- ally machined base. When more and more customers started to realize the potential of metal additive manufacturing, conformal cooling and the resulting cycle time reductions, Fassnacht decided to take the technology in-house. He invested in a laser cusing machine from Concept Laser in 2008. "Meanwhile, we have found ways to manufacture many additively-generated inserts more cheaply than convention- ally-machined ones," Fassnacht says. "Since we cannot use the machine to its full capacity, we also do contract work for other companies, including local mold shops." According to Fassnacht, competition comes from Asia, not from the mold shop around the corner. He enjoys talking to other shop owners to exchange information and share ideas and news on the latest developments. He says, "Competitions like the one in Aachen bring tool and moldmakers together. This is how I learned about metal additive manufacturing and became one of the first moldmakers to bring such a machine in-house. We all need to cooperate, not compete." FOR MORE INFORMATION W. Fassnacht Werkzeug- und Formenbau / formenbau-fassnacht.de/en/ Concept Laser / concept-laser.de/en/home.html CONTRIBUTOR Barbara Schulz is Gardner Business Media's European correspondent. She can be reached at bschulz@gardnerweb.com.